


Angels and crooks

by Nuredhel



Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms
Genre: AU, All Humans, Bard and Thran married, Bard is a cop, Barduil - Freeform, CSI Style, Crime, Drug Abuse, Family, M/M, Thran is a profiler, Violence, everyday life at a police station, modern day AU, nasty people, sequel to Beast, solving crime, some sexual situations
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-11-12
Updated: 2018-12-17
Packaged: 2019-02-01 12:24:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 10
Words: 118,541
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12704937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nuredhel/pseuds/Nuredhel
Summary: Bard and Thran are getting used to their new life as a married couple, and their new responsibilities as a family. But they still have their jobs and my oh my does that bring some interesting situations and challenges into their existence. Having both experience and special gifts does help, but at times reality can be more bizarre than anyone can expect.This is a sequel to the story Beast.





	1. Wild horses

**Author's Note:**

> This is a sequel to Beast and it is smart to read that first or else this story may be a bit confusing. It is a modern Au where Bard is a police investigator and Thran a profiler and shrink. Bard used to be married but lost his wife and Thran was forced to marry to produce an heir.

Chapter 1: Wild horses….

Rosalind was trying to drag the monster of a vacuum cleaner through the door, it was a bit too wide and had to be sort of twisted around so she could drag it in sideways. The carpet had to be vacuumed today, the boss and his missis were having a party later that evening and God help her if everything wasn’t in perfect order by the time the first guests arrived. She was thanking the holy virgin that she wasn’t the one in charge of the food, it would have been a challenge she wasn’t able to handle at all. In this house everything had to be perfect, at all times. But that was a façade, she had seen through it from day one and she knew that the day her contract ended she would be out of there like a bat out of hell. She had worked for a lot of rich people before but none had been as obnoxious as Mr Masters. 

Rosalind was a very professional person, a housekeeper who knew all the tricks and she was used to being treated with respect but Mrs Masters did regard her as some sort of slave and Rosalind was not going to be shocked if the bitch someday came there demanding that Rosalind and the other servants started referring to Mr Masters as “masta” No, it wouldn’t shock her at all. She knew where all the wealth came from, and she hated their guts for nothing had come from hard honest work but from fraud and exploitation of others. There was no deed too foul if it could bring this family more money and the master of the house was acting like some general, laying deliberate plans for how they were to get even more money. They had a team of cut throat lawyers willing to do whatever Mr Masters said as long as they got paid a little extra under the table and it was just terrible business. 

They had two kids and Rosalind did pity them, even if they were insufferable brats. The boy was just two years of age and really a cute kid but he was left to the nanny and the mother didn’t really bother with him at all. The girl was eight and a real queen bee who was so spoiled it was hard to believe. She got everything she wanted, except from true love and care from her parents. It was tragic. Rosalind did drag the goddamn machine into the huge living room, the mansion had several and this was the “white” room. Here everything was kept in white and gold and it was beautiful but lacked a soul. Rosalind grunted, Mrs Masters had as usual referred to her as “Rosalynn” when she spoke to the housekeeper and Rosalind had stopped complaining, Mrs Masters was too unintelligent to understand. The woman was the poster child for trophy wives, pretty, dumb and willing to fuck anything as long as it gave her status and wealth. 

The housekeeper did finish the carpet in the front area, there was a smaller room adjacent to the living room which was referred to as the “lounge” and she had to take care of the carpet there as well. It was Mr Masters favourite room and it was held in wood white and brown. It did stink of cigar smoke and whiskey and Rosalind did grimace. The carpet would be full of half smoked buds and god alone knew what else, it would be a mess to clean up. Mr Masters had been visited by some friends the day before and it had been a rather fierce party. She turned around to get the vacuum cleaner in between a coffee table and a monster of a couch and then she froze. She saw a pair of legs sticking out from the huge armchair Mr Masters always sat in, it was so big the man disappeared completely into it. Had he fallen asleep there, again?! She saw a glass of scotch on the table by the chair, he had probably started to “repair” from the day before. She bit her lower lip, he hated being interrupted but he couldn’t sit there now, there were preparations to be done. “Mr Masters? It is Rosalind…” 

She kept her voice low and respectful and hoped that it would lessen the wrath she was sure she would experience in few seconds. Mr Masters was always extremely cranky when he was hungover. There wasn’t any sign of movement and she cleared her throat. “Mr Masters? Are you awake?” 

She took one more step forwards, rounded the table and then she saw. She stared with wide eyes before she let out a scream which was heard all through the house. All she could think was that the Lord did know justice after all.   
\----------  
Bard was busy with some paperwork, they had just finished a very difficult case involving a bank worker who had embezzled money for years and it had been like trying to find your way out of a maze. The man had been extremely clever and had known how to cover up his tracks but at the end Elisa’s hacker friend Erestor had managed to trace the money to an account in a bank located on Iceland of all places. The headquarters had been rebuilt after the whole Shrike incident and Thor was back in charge, things were back to normal but they still missed many of those who had died and they had all been changed, in some way or the other. Bard had to smile, he was newly wedded and more happy than ever before and now the future did look very bright. He had already noticed that he was getting better at seeing the truth, piercing through lies and digging his way into whatever was hidden underneath the veneer most people show the world. The same could be said for Thran and they did work so well together. They had spent a week in Hawaii just after the wedding and it had been a week he never would forget. He had to smile, a small and blissful smile before he returned to the screen. Paperwork was one thing they couldn’t escape, no matter what sort of gifts they had been given.   
He was busy trying to organize some files when his phone did buzz, it was a text from Judith and he frowned. It only said two things. “The morgue, now!”

It was odd, there hadn’t been anyone mentioning any new murders now? He raised his head, Thor was working and didn’t seem to be taking any calls and the entire station was very peaceful. It usually was now this early in the year, the cold meant that even the crooks stayed indoors. He got up and walked downstairs to the new morgue, it was larger and more modern than the old one and it wasn’t even a wee bit more cosy. A morgue was a morgue, no matter what. Judith was standing by one of the tables and it was covered with a huge sheet and the shape was odd, what the hell? She saw him and grinned. “Hello. I was thinking of you, I bet you are bored out of your skull and this is the most bizarre thing I have seen in a very long time” 

Bard tilted his head. “Bizarre?” 

Judith nodded vigorously. “Yeah, you know, being a coroner means that you get to see everything, and I thought I had but nope, this job does still have some shocks left for me. It is truly one of a kind, an accident.” 

Bard got closer and Judith did pull the sheet off. The deceased was a middle aged Caucasian male with a slight case of obesity and a somewhat groomed appearance but what created the odd shape was his head. Or rather, the thing attached to his head. It was another head, the stuffed out head of a deer and the antlers were firmly buried in the dead man’s skull. It looked as if the deer and the man was locked in a sort of staring competition. Bard had to gasp. “What in….” 

Judith almost giggled. “Damn right, this unfortunate fellah was sitting in his favourite chair, sipping some good scotch when the screws holding that monstrosity decided to give way and boom, sixty pounds of deer head fell straight onto his head. I bet he shot that deer too, this could be some sort of post mortem pay back” 

Bard had to grin. “Yes, that wouldn’t surprise me.” 

Judith threw the blanket back over the body. “Now, let us give this poor animal some dignity back, I just hate trophy hunting” 

Bard knew this, Judith loved animals and he did too. “Yes, so who was he, the man I mean, not the poor deer?” 

Judith made a grand gesture. “This is the not so honourable Mr Duke Masters, officially a real estate agent but in reality he is among the worst scumbags I have ever come across. He is making a living out of suing the shit out of people, and he has no scruples whatsoever.” 

Bard had to frown. “And you are sure it was an accident? It couldn’t have been foul play? Who found him by the way?” 

Judith was picking up some tools, staring at them with narrow eyes. “Their housekeeper did find him, tough woman for she wasn’t all that shocked. The wife however lost it, completely hysterical. I think she must have seen all her status fly out of the door there and then.” 

Bard had to snicker. “Alright, but it was an accident?” 

Judith nodded. “I see no signs of it being anything else no, at least not yet. Murder by stuffed deer, that would indeed be a first.” 

Bard stared at the covered body. “Any kids?” 

Judith found a pair of bolt cutters. “Two, a two year old boy and an eight year old girl, I saw her when we picked up the body, spoiled piece of shit if you ask me” 

She lifted the cutters. “I am so tempted at breaking the skull to remove the antlers, it would be a darn shame to cut something so beautiful.” 

Bard had to laugh. “Oh I bet you will come up with some trick, at least the stag did get its vengeance” 

Judith did send him a very wry grin. “Yes, and I will have the unfortunate pleasure of cutting this carcass open, with that body I am sure I will find clogged arteries and god alone what else.” 

Bard grinned. “Right, have fun then.” 

Judith started a power saw, her face the very incarnation of bloodthirst. “Will do!”

Bard walked back upstairs and to his delight he did see that Thran had arrived, the profiler had been visiting the local jail to make an interview and he did look a bit tense. Bard walked over and gave his spouse a swift hug. “You look like shit dear, come, I have just seen the most absurd thing ever!”

Thran smiled and hung his coat on the rack by Bard’s desk, he was always dressed to impress and the tall blonde did normally make just about anyone swoon. “Good, I have just tried to understand the mind of a person who is so scrambled up mentally I don’t even know where to start. Damn it, the guy is both schizophrenic and a bipolar and I bet he is a psychopath on top of it all. “ 

Bard made Thran sit down, he wanted to kiss him but knew that Thor disapproved of such displays of passion while they were working. There were people visiting the station all the time and some didn’t approve of same sex relationships at all. “Listen, Judith just showed me a dead guy, with a stuffed deer head stuck to his skull. It had fallen off the wall and the antlers had pierced his head.” 

Thran had to gape. “Seriously? Now that is Karma for you, if he was the shooter that is” 

Bard chuckled. “Bet he was, a piece of work as Judith puts it, real scumbag” 

Thran snickered. “Ah, poetic justice in action, always a wonder to behold” 

Bard swallowed hard, there was something else which also was a wonder to behold, damnation, still five hours before their shift ended. Thran got up with a sigh. “Right, I have to make a report, have no clue of what I am going to write though. The judge wants a real diagnosis and if I am to write everything down it will be a list as long as a bad year” 

Bard shrugged. “Stark raving lunatic, that ought to do it” 

Thran had to laugh, a full warm laughter which made Bard feel all fuzzy inside. “And I bet the judge would appreciate such an assessment, the jury would be all over it. No, I need something real, something impressive.” 

Bard grinned widely. “Come up with something, call it “Mc Clusky’s syndrome”, or bilateral Triassic brain contortion” 

Thran had to gape, then he laughed even louder. “Oh that was precious, yes, the last one ought to impress them, unless there is a geologist or palaeontologist among them!”

Thran gave him a swift hug and walked over to his office and Bard chuckled and dove into the world of economic fraud once more. He was working for about an hour when Thor suddenly appeared in the doorway. “Bard? Sorry to interrupt, but we have gotten ourselves a murder. I want you and Thran on it” 

Bard got up. “A murder, now?” 

Thor nodded. “I got a call from Judith, the antlered dude, it wasn’t an accident, unless dead deer have started to fire off nine mm bullets.” 

Bard frowned. “What?” 

Thor nodded slowly. “You heard me, the dead dude, there was a bullet wound in his head and the antlers were jabbed into it, probably to cover it up. If Judith hadn’t decided to do an x ray of the head she would never have discovered it” 

Bard swallowed. “Right, so, where do we start?” 

Thor sighed and he did look tired. “Listen, this guy had more enemies than Hitler, so the list of possible suspects is longer than the passenger list of Titanic. But I have made a smaller list here, people he has sued for great amounts of money, and gotten sued back with no result. I bet there could be someone among them who feels bitter enough to try to avenge themselves this way.” 

Bard was handed over a list and the names didn’t tell him anything. “So, he did sue people, and made a living out of it. What sort of cases are we talking about?” 

Thor got a hard expression on his face. “The very worst, he has been targeting small businesses, those who cannot afford good lawyers, and still have some money he can take. Here, this name” 

He pointed at a name at the bottom of the list. It said “Mrs Eleanor Bloom, florist” and Bard frowned. “A florist, who the heck sues a florist?” 

Thor did look intense. “Someone who is a predator, with no conscience at all. Mrs Masters did visit the shop to buy some roses and on the way out she “slipped” on the doorstep and injured her ankle. They sued the poor woman for a million and she lost, had to close down the business.” 

Bard felt a surge of anger. “Oh my Lord, then Mr Masters was a real piece of shit. So, who should we talk to first?” 

Thor pointed at another name near the top. “This couple here, they live just two hours out of the city and the rest on the list are placed all over the place. They never targeted people in the same state twice, so you see, they were good at this shit” 

Bard knew that if their names had showed up in the files of the state attorney more than once alarm bells would have gone off, it was infernal and smart. “Green meadow farms?” 

Thor nodded. “Yes, horse breeders, if you go now you will be back by the evening” 

Bard felt a sting of excitement. He didn’t care that much about horses but Thran did and he was an expert too. He would love this. He ran over to Thran’s office and his husband was suddenly very eager when he heard of the case and where they were heading. Before long they were in Thran’s car and on their way southwest. It did in fact feel good to be out of the city, even if it was for just some hours.   
\------  
The drive did take some time, the roads were good but there was work being done in two places and the traffic did seep by slowly as a snail. The weather was rather dark when they reached the farm, it was a very nice place with several stables and paddocks and it did look very well maintained. They parked and left the car, there was a sort of office there and they headed that way, the place did smell of horse and they saw several very nice specimens in the paddocks. Bard had checked the papers, the owners were Mr and Mrs Holt and they had to be somewhere in their sixties. The office was empty, the door was locked and Bard scratched his head, it didn’t seem as if the owners were at home for the main building was dark too and there weren’t any cars in the garage. Thran made a grimace. “I hope we haven’t come all this way for nothing?” 

Bard was about to say something apologetic sounding when they heard a voice. “Hello? Are you looking for the boss?” 

A woman was peeking out of a stable door and Bard saw that she was wearing overalls and a cap. She did look like a stable worker and she seemed to be the type of a person who isn’t afraid of getting her hands dirty. “Ah, yes, they aren’t at home?” 

The woman shook her head and closed the door, walked over with the relaxed ease of a person who is well used to physical work. She was of medium height and her body stocky with obvious strength and the face was round and a bit red and she seemed like a genuinely friendly person. “No, they went upstate earlier today, a horse show. You haven’t made an appointment?” 

Bard shook his head. “No, I am sorry ma’am, we haven’t.” 

He held up his badge and the woman frowned. “The police?! What is this about?” 

Bard cleared his throat. “A certain Mr Masters who I believe that Mr and Mrs Holt did come to blows with last year?” 

The woman gaped, then her face turned into a mask of hopeful joy. “Oh damn it, don’t tell me he is dead?!”

Bard nodded. “Uh, yes, he is dead?” 

She jumped up and down, laughing. “Oh wonderful, what a day! I will celebrate for sure. I do hope the son of a bitch suffered?” 

Thran stared at the woman, he did look shocked. “You don’t appear to be shocked?” 

The woman shook her head, some locks of long auburn hair did escape from the cap. “That is because I am not, was he murdered?” 

Bard had to nod and she let out a small squeal of joy. “Praised be every God there is, finally! I want to shake the hand of the murderer, that person has done mankind a huge favour” 

Thran had to swallow hard. “Ah, ma’am, you are aware of how this makes you look? This is a murder investigation” 

She laughed. “Oh I understand, don’t worry. I didn’t kill the bastard but by every deity, I wish I did.” 

Thran frowned. “I think you’d better explain this, first of all, who are you?” 

The woman smiled, she was very charming when she smiled, and her green eyes were sparkling. “I am Nerdanel Wood, I have worked here as the stable manager for the Holts for thirty years.” 

Bard shivered a little, it was cold there and she saw and waved her hand. “You are freezing, follow me, we can talk in my office, it is warm” 

She walked ahead and they had to follow, they rounded a stable and entered a door and the office was rather large with a lot of tall closets and a table and some chairs. There were pictures of horses and prizes everywhere. She sat down and grasped some cups, a coffee machine was bubbling loudly in a corner. “Want some coffee? I have only two types, black and blacker” 

Thran had to grin. “Black is fine with me” 

Bard nodded. “Me too” 

She poured and gave them a generous dose each and took a huge cup herself. There was a sort of screen in the corner and Bard leaned over and looked at it. It was a feed from a box and a horse was wandering around in it, in obvious distress. Nerdanel nodded at the screen. “Our birthing box, that mare is going to give birth anytime now, I was checking in on her when you arrived. I cannot leave here until it is over with. Princess is a very valuable mare and the foal will be even more valuable, last foal to be born fathered by old Infernal.” 

Thran did look puzzled. “Infernal?” 

Nerdanel nodded and sipped her coffee. “Yes, Infernal mystery, one of the best studs there has ever been, he died two years ago and Princess was inseminated with the last dose of semen from that stallion. The foal better be good or we will be very disappointed” 

Bard knew a little about horse breeding because of Jean and his late wife Sophia, he knew how valuable a foal like that could be. “So, the fact that you hate Mr Masters?” 

Nerdanel lifted a leg and put it over the other one. “Oh yes, that!”

She leaned forwards. “When that bastard did sue Mr and Mrs Holt he ruined their livelihood, in the horse society your reputation means everything! Nobody wants to deal with someone who has tried to trick someone with a sale.” 

Thran tried not to cringe, the coffee was warm but way too old, he guessed that it had been re-heated several times. “So a sale was at the bottom of this conflict?” 

She nodded and leaned into the chair. “Listen, this dude did this trick of his many times, there are scores of people dying to strangle him to death with their own hands. I have done some investigation myself and he used every method in the book and then some. He was all over the place, and used many names too. Mr and Mrs Holt are such nice people, they couldn’t harm a fly! But that creep did break their hearts and caused them to lose so much money there was a chance of them losing the ranch for a while. They had to sell some of their very best brood mares to make it.”

Thran tilted his head. “We have understood that Mr Masters was a very cunning fraud artist yes” 

She scoffed. “Yes, and so much more, try psychopath. An abuser of animals, of people’s trust and of the law. Those lawyers of his are more vicious than a swarm of piranhas.” 

Bard was getting curious. “So, what did he really do here? Why did he sue Mr and Mrs Holt? And why are you so angry at him?” 

Nerdanel crossed her arms over her chest, she was a formidable woman, the arms were muscular and Bard bet that neither of them would have been able to subdue her. Someone used to handle a ton of horse is not someone you should pick a fight with. “I am angry because he did spread doubt about my skills and integrity as well, and I do not accept it when someone makes me look like a goddamn liar.” 

She pulled out a drawer and picked out a photo, handed it over to Thran. “See, this is what the whole debacle is about” 

Thran stared at the photo, showed it to Bard. It was a horse, a very beautiful filly who stared into the camera with huge trustful eyes. “That is a beauty” 

She cocked her head. “You know horses Mr?” 

Thran smiled. “Oropherson, Yes, I do own a few” 

She smiled widely. “Great, then you can understand this. That is Velvet Peach, the best filly this farm has ever produced.” 

Thran stared at the photo again, the filly was a gorgeous palomino and the confirmation and shape of the horse was perfection made flesh and bone. “She is gorgeous” 

Nerdanel sighed. “Yes, she was perfection. “ 

Thran frowned. “Was?” 

She nodded slowly. “It is a terrible story really, but Mr and Mrs Holt loved that filly. She was going to be a champion show horse for sure, and they waited until she was three before they put her out for sale. We do sell horses, that is how we make a living but they didn’t really want to sell her, she was precious to them” 

Bard leaned forwards. “Mr Masters bought her?” 

Nerdanel had a very sarcastic grin on her face. “Yes, there was another couple here too bidding for her but they were probably there just to push the prize up. “

Bard did feel a bit confused. “Press the prize up?” 

She nodded. “That is the core of the whole damn thing you see, she was untried, a three years old quarter horse filly. Even with her perfect pedigree and looks you couldn’t ask for all that much” 

Thran sighed “I think I see the picture” 

Nerdanel nodded “Any horse lover will yes. They said they wanted a horse for their daughter, she was like six at the time? Way too young for a full size horse and absolutely not one who had just been through basic training but they did want Velvet and offered so much money for her that Mr and Mrs Holt gave in. “ 

Thran was a bit tense around his mouth. “They were fooled then?” 

Nerdanel nodded solemnly. “Indeed they were. The Masters took Velvet and we didn’t hear anything more for five months, then we received a call from a lawyer, telling us that we were being sued for having sold a useless horse” 

Bard swallowed hard. “Useless?” 

Nerdanel nodded. “Blind Mr Bowman, but it was a huge fat lie.” 

Thran was making notes. “Explain please” 

Nerdanel made a gesture. “You see, they wanted Velvet for a specific reason, we do have other horses here way better suited for their kid and horses who were more expensive too, but Velvet’s grandsire was a stallion who was the carrier of a rare genetic disorder. Some of his offspring and grandchildren have been born with it” 

Thran was frowning. “They claimed that Velvet had the disease?” 

Nerdanel nodded and her eyes were dark, anger seething in them. “Yes, you see, the disease can be held at bay using medication, he claimed that we had medicated Velvet so the disease was invisible when they bought her.” 

Bard started to understand her anger. “And that can be traced I bet?” 

She nodded. “He had a vet working for him, the guy is corrupted and an idiot, claimed that he had found traces of medication in Velvet’s blood. It was a fat lie” 

She grasped the photo. “I have been working with horses my entire life and a foal born with that condition will suffer from several symptoms from birth. One is that it is unable to suckle on its own. Velvet was on her feet suckling within half an hour, she was so healthy and I know the symptoms and the disease well. He claimed that I was just an ignorant fool and knew naught about medicine” 

Thran did look as if he had tasted something which tasted bad. “I see” 

She put the photo back into the drawer. “They said that Velvet went blind just weeks after they bought her, that she was nervous and skittish and dangerous to be around. It was also bullshit, I had ridden her with a blindfold several times to make her trust my signals and she was as calm as they come.”

Bard frowned. “So they sued your employers because of this?” 

She nodded. “Yes, and ruined their reputation with it. That goddamn crook of a vet had been bought and told a lot of lies. Mr and Mrs Holt offered to buy the mare back but was told that she had been destroyed already, since she was dangerous to be around” 

Bard gasped. “That is very…bad” 

Nerdanel sighed. “No shit, only evidence was that vet and some photo’s he had taken. Mrs Holt was so heartbroken I was afraid she would die here, she loved that filly. There wasn’t a mean bone in Velvet, not one!” 

Thran was tense. “How much did Mr Masters get?” 

Nerdanel sneered. “Two million dollars, heard anything like that? The lawyers were screaming loudly about emotional damage to the kid who lost “Her best friend” and how the “entire family” was mourning and so on and so forth. Worst lies ever if you ask me. Bastard!”

Thran was blinking. “Two mill? Oh God, that is…a lot!” 

Nerdanel grinned, a very sardonic grin. “Wanna know what’s worse? They did trick the insurance company too, that is why the mare had to be more expensive for the more you pay for a horse the more you can get from the insurance.” 

Bard was feeling a bit faint. “The amount of money he got?” 

Nerdanel grinned again, she did look like she was trying to bite into a sour lemon. “One point six mill, for a horse they bought for a hundred grand. Call that the catch of the century ha?” 

Thran looked at Bard, his eyes were shooting lightening. “If Mr Masters did this to more people there is no wonder why he got killed” 

Nerdanel smiled again and there was shadows in her eyes. “The story could have ended here but I think fate sometimes plays a strange game. You see, a dead horse cannot just be buried, it has to be delivered to a factory where they do transform biological waste into everything from biofuel to soap” 

Thran nodded. “Yes, the new laws against pollution of the ground water.” 

Nerdanel nodded and folded her arms again. “There was this one guy working at the plant, he had worked for Mr and Mrs Holt one summer, painting fences and he did recognize the brand on the dead filly. He suspected foul play and took some photos of his own, and also some more before he called me.” 

She grasped some other photos from a drawer. “See. What do you see?” 

Bard tilted his head. “A horses eye, with cataracts?” 

Nerdanel nodded. “Yes, apparently, to a layman that would be rather obvious. They said that the cataracts came the moment Velvet no longer was being medicated and that the disease had been well known from the moment she was born, that Mr and Mrs Holt had sold a sick horse deliberately.” 

She got up and opened a fridge in the corner, took something out of it, it was a box which normally contains ice cream. She opened it and Bard gasped, it was two horse eyes, covered with frost and looking very peculiar. “See? He took the eyes out of her before he sent the body to be cremated. This isn’t cataracts, for cataracts come from within the eye, if you look closely you will see that it is the top layer of the eye which has been burned off with acid”

Thran cringed and swore and Bard had to cough “Burned off?” 

She nodded. “Yes, with acid. I did take some tests before I put them in the freezer. The vet must have done it and then taken the pictures before the damage became too great to look convincing.” 

She put the pictures down and closed the ice box again. “I wanted to drag him to court myself, for animal cruelty and for slandering my name. But I don’t have the money, nor have I the influence. All I could do was to wait for fate to catch up with that abomination of a man. I am so glad it finally has” 

Thran swallowed visibly. “Poor horse, acid! It must have been terrible, such agony” 

Nerdanel nodded. “Yes, but I have friends everywhere, we horse people do stand together when we need to and I told everyone I knew to keep their ears and eyes open. I found a lot of shit, yes, a whole barrel of it” 

She opened another drawer and pulled out a lot of papers. “Here, at least ten similar cases. All involving horses. He used the same corrupt vet each time, the guy has a gambling problem and when Mr Master’s did pay him to do something less than legal he would wag his tail and be an obedient little bitch” 

Thran frowned. “How can that vet still have a licence?” 

Nerdanel smiled. “Because Mr Masters knows who to bribe and who to blackmail. The man was a beast” 

Thran nodded silently to Bard, she was telling the truth, with his new gifts he did sense that rather well and Bard agreed. This woman hadn’t murdered Mr Masters but she did have a reason to hate him for sure. “So, these are all cases where Mr Masters have used the same technique?” 

She grinned, a very narrow and ugly grin. “Yes, it is all in there. Never twice in the same state, never the same insurance company and never the same method.” 

Thran grumbled. “He is being thorough then, preparing well.” 

She crossed her arms. “He made it his livelihood to ruin others. There are people on this list who have lost everything, one man did commit suicide. Imagine that?”

Bard felt his throat go dry, he was reading through the list and it was terrifying. “This case here, the stallion with a fractured leg? An accident?” 

Nerdanel scoffed. “No, deliberate! They bought that one horse because the bloodline is infamous for brittle bones. He was checked tough, seemingly healthy. I bet they hit him over the leg with an iron pipe, or something like that.” 

Thran was a bit wild eyed. “Well, I am starting to be feel very glad that Mr Masters no longer is around, he comes across as a true creep” 

Nerdanel nodded. “I hope you don’t suspect Mr and Mrs Holt of this? They are not capable of harming anyone and this whole case has brought them such misery and pain, I would hate it if you were to rub even more salt into their wounds.” 

Thran sent her a swift smile. “I don’t think that anyone here will be on the list of suspects no, but can you think of anyone who would be desperate enough to actually kill Mr Masters?” 

Nerdanel let out a short snort. “Yeah? Like half the people on the list, but the main suspect would in my eyes be Ms Geraldine Proudfoot. “ 

She pointed at the list and Bard read the details. “The Masters did buy a pony from her and the animal died from some sort of colic three weeks later? Colic does happen to horses quite often doesn’t it?” 

Nerdanel smiled. “Yes, but this particular type is chronic and caused by changes in the gut. They said the pony had suffered from it since it was a foal. A lie of course, the vet even brought the diseased guts to the court. But I know a person who was there and he said that the guts presented came from a much larger animal than the pony.” 

Bard got up. “I see, I think we will go and visit this lady then. So she was angrier than most she was being sued?” 

Nerdanel cocked her head. “Try furious, absolutely raging. She did say she wanted to kill Mr Masters though, and I think she meant it too. That woman is infamous for having a flaring temper, she is amazing with the horses but she did punch a guy who insulted her once and she has a restraining order against her ex. She tried to rape him with a broomstick, for having grasped some other woman’s butt. “

Thran cringed. “Oh my, well, then she is capable of attacking someone for sure” 

Nerdanel did look nervous. “Listen. I hope she didn’t do it. She is a very decent person and I know her rather well, but if she did kill Mr Masters I cannot say that I hold it against her at all. He has ruined the lives of so many people I hope they have a very special place for him in hell” 

Thran too got up. “So do we, thank you for your time Ma’am. It was most enlightening” 

Nerdanel did shake their hands. “I am glad I could be of help, do call me if you need an expert ha? Now I have got to check on Princess once more, she is getting close I think” 

The screen showed that the mare had laid down now and Bard smiled. “Do that, we’d better get going” 

Thran took a deep breath when they got outside, heading for the car. “I bet that someone in the horse community is behind this, that list is long, and nasty!”

Bard got inside and fastened his seat belt. “Indeed, but we have to get back to the station before we go anywhere else. We need to spread this information, we cannot check everyone on the list, we won’t be done until next year!”

Thran started the car, his eyes were dark. “Yes, but know what? That guy deserved it, I cannot say anything else for then I would be lying” 

They were silent as they drove back to the city, Thran hadn’t even turned on the radio and Bard did know him very well now, it meant that he was angry and shaken and Bard wished that he could have done something to soothe his husband’s distress. They arrived at the station just before their shift ended and had time to delegate some tasks to the evening shift. Bard wanted as much as possible done before the morrow, he suspected that the next day would be busy for sure. 

When they got back home Sigrid was waiting for them in the doorway, she was grinning from one ear to the other holding a letter. She had finished her exam with top scores and Bard was very proud of her. Bain and Legolas were visiting some friends of Bain and would stay there until the next day and Tilda was watching TV and tormenting Jean with constant questions about everything she saw. Jean had opened the restaurant just a month earlier and it was still in its early stages so the workload was monumental. The woman didn’t mind that at all, it was a dream come true and she had gotten some very good stable workers for her horses so she didn’t have to do all the dirty work anymore. 

Bard did hug Tilda too and was glad Thran had been able to help her overcome her old trauma, she was doing better now and Thran was sure she would become completely normal before long. Jean had already eaten dinner with the kids but there was two huge portions left for the two men and Bard and Thran did sit down to eat. The rule was that they never brought their work with them back home but this time it was hard shoving it away. Jean was after all a horse breeder and she probably knew a lot of the people on the list. As they ate Bard shot of a question. “Say, you shouldn’t happen to know a lady by the name of Geraldine Proudfoot?” 

Jean lifted her head, looked puzzled. “As a matter of fact I do, how come?” 

Barn shrugged. “Oh, I just came across the name during an investigation, it was unusual and I saw she is a horse breeder too?” 

Jean nodded. “Yes, she breeds ponies. Very good at it. But she has had some bad luck lately, fell down a flight of stairs and broke her pelvis a month ago, apparently she won’t be able to ride again for at least a year. Poor woman” 

Thran bit his lower lip and shook his head, Geraldine was out of the question then, the one who had killed Mr Masters had to be a healthy strong person. They finished the dinner in silence and watched some TV before they went to bed. Now they shared a massive bedroom in the new house and it had an adjacent and very luxurious bathroom and Bard enjoyed a good soak before he joined his husband in bed. Thran was very quiet and Bard leaned over and planted a kiss on his cheek. “You are being bothered by this case aren’t you?” 

Thran sighed and kissed him back, with some hunger. He would often use the passion they shared as a shield between himself and the dark realities of their work and Bard didn’t complain. “Yes, that man was…I don’t know whether he was truly evil or just incredibly stupid!”  
Bard felt that Thran tensed up, and knew what to do to ease him. “Call it both then” 

He snaked his way down underneath the covers and Thran gasped and arched, surrendered to Bard’s touch completely. Before long they were lost in each other and the world outside of their little lovers nest completely forgotten.   
\----------  
The next morning Thor met them the moment they arrived at work, he was a bit tired and his eyes were distant. “I had the evening and night shift go through everyone on the list, they had alibies, most of the rock solid too. One person was in hospital, and another one died a week ago.” 

Bard frowned. “Someone could have paid someone else to do the job?”

Thor nodded. “We have checked that too, Erestor has been all over the finances of the suspects, nothing which indicates any payments out of the ordinary. I think we are looking at this from the wrong angle” 

Thran tilted his head, he had braided his hair and it did make him look very regal. “What do you mean?” 

Thor sort of grimaced. “I have worked within the police for decades, and I think we need to broaden our horizon” 

Bard nodded. “You don’t think it had anything to do with Mr Masters lifestyle?”

Thor shrugged. “Call me a weird old man but my gut tells me we are missing something here.” 

Bard had to ponder this for a moment. “You are right, damn it. We should have seen it, the murder wasn’t premeditated, it was perhaps done in desperation” 

Thran closed his eyes. “Yes, it was a desperate move, the antlers in the head, it was done by someone who was scared, shocked and probably not anticipating any trouble” 

Bard lifted his cell phone. “I need to make a swift call” 

He dialled Judith’s number and she answered right away. “Yes?” 

Bard cleared his voice. “Judith, how much force do you need to achieve what was done to Mr Masters? I mean, a skull is hard yes?” 

Judith’s voice got a bit distant. “A lot, there was one bullet wound but the antler on the other side was just as deeply embedded in the head, heck, all the points were in there. It was done with great force” 

Bard nodded. “Then we aren’t looking for a woman but a rather strong man right?” 

She answered. “Most definitely. A tall man, capable of tearing that deerhead off the wall in one go” 

Bard thanked her and hung up, Thor did look rather pessimistic. “Mr Masters had a lot of associates, and he did also have many so called friends. It will take forever going through them all, I bet he had made enemies also outside of his rather doubtful suing business.” 

Thran grunted. “Indeed. Where do we start?” 

Bard was about to answer when they saw a woman approaching the entrance, she was of Mexican origin and very pretty but above her youth. Thor frowned. “Who is that?” 

Bard shrugged. “I don’t know?” 

The woman saw them and walked over, she carried a basket over her arm and she did appear to have some self-confidence for she carried her head high. “I am looking for the ones who is investigation the murder of Mr Masters? I am Rosalind, Mr Masters housekeeper” 

Thor smiled with a polite bow. “You are looking at them ma’am.” 

Rosalind stared at the two very handsome men and she smiled, a swift almost shy smile. “I was interviewed yesterday, but there was something I discovered this very morning, something odd” 

Thor tilted his head. “Yes?” 

Rosalind swallowed. “Mr Masters did buy a small hand carved table four days ago, it was shaped like a bear, with a glass plate on top of it, as if the animal was carrying the plate see?” 

Bard nodded. “Yes, and ?” 

She took a deep breath. “He used it to place his booze somewhere classy, there were drawers in the bear, almost invisible. But this morning I did notice that the table was gone, and the door to the patio wasn’t locked” 

Thran tensed up. “The table, was it very valuable?” 

Rosalind shook her head. “No, but he bought it from a private person, not an antiquity shop. He saw a picture of it online and wanted it, he was a bit proud of it for the bear was very realistic and would fit his lounge perfectly” 

Bard stared at Thran. “And now it is gone? Know what? It has to mean something!”

Thor smiled at Rosalind. “You shouldn’t happen to know who he bought that table from?” 

Rosalind grasped a note from her basket. “Here, I did notice the name you see, it is unusual” 

Bard stared. “Mr Festus Underhill, 345 Raven hill road” 

She nodded. “Yes, apparently a wood artist of some sorts” 

Thran smiled and he did look like a dog who has caught a fresh scent. “I think we ought to pay a visit to Mr Underhill” 

Thor nodded . “Go, the table has to mean something.” 

Thran ran into his office and got his gun and Bard frowned. “You don’t like guns?” 

Thran nodded. “I don’t but I feel as if we may need it this time” 

They ran to the car and took off and the address was just twenty minutes away so they arrived there fast. The house was a large one with a huge yard in front of it and it was filled with wood in all shapes and sizes. Several tables filled with tools were placed there and Bard frowned, the placement was a bit odd? The tables were low and so were the power tools and machinery they saw and he had to gape. A half finished table stood that the end of the yard and it was shaped like four leaping trout standing on their tails and they would hold the table top balanced on top of their slightly bowed heads when it was over. The work was exquisite and so lifelike it was almost scary. 

Thran was staring at the table and Bard had a strong suspicion that this table or one like it would decorate their living room rather fast unless the carver was the guilty one. They admired the work when they heard a sound and turned around. A man sitting in a wheelchair did enter the yard, he had lost his legs and a huge scar decorated the face from beneath the left eye to below the jawline. “Can I help you?” 

The voice was gruff and yet the man did look very friendly, there was sawdust all over him so he was the artist for sure. Bard showed him the badge and the man frowned. “Coppers? Here?” 

Bard nodded. “Uh, we are here because of a table, one you sold to Mr Masters some days ago?” 

The man lightened up. “Oh yes, the bear! It was a heck of a lot of work, but the table was perfect. Has anything happened to it?” 

Thran sort of shrugged. “Well, Mr Masters was killed yesterday, and the table vanished last night” 

Mr Underhill stared at them, his eyes got wide. “Oh fuck, now that is…bad! I didn’t like the dude for he was way too eager to pick the table up, I didn’t have time to finish the job before he came for it” 

Thran frowned. “Really?” 

The man nodded vigorously. “Yes, I had one layer of lacquer left, the wood wouldn’t get its perfect shine without it, but he wanted it for a party and couldn’t wait. I got paid full price but I don’t like sending off something which isn’t complete.” 

Thran and Bard stared at each other and felt confused. Bard tried to think. “Say, there wasn’t anyone else bidding for the table?” 

Mr Underhill shook his head. “No, I put it online for sale the same day Mr Masters contacted me, nobody else had any time to bid for it. But there was one thing though…” 

Thran took a deep breath. “Yes?” 

Mr Underhill stared at them. “I have this guy working here, he cleans stuff, sharpens my tools and keeps things in order. I cannot do much without legs ha ha ha” 

Bard swallowed. “Veteran?” 

Mr Underhill nodded. “Yep, Afghanistan, ten years ago, fucking anti-tank mine, killed five good marines and took my legs and half of my face with them. I have been lucky though, I have my art, many others have nothing, except bitterness and booze” 

Thran swallowed. “It is good to see that you have found a new meaning, but the man you mentioned?” 

Mr Underhill nodded. “Mog yes, we just call him that here, he blew a fuse when I told him the table was sold and already picked up. I don’t know why though, he just cussed and left, I haven’t seen him afterwards” 

Bard’s eyes got narrow. “Aha, there are drawers in the table?” 

Mr Underhill nodded. “Yes, some hidden ones too” 

Thran sighed. “I think Mog must have hidden something in the table, it is the only logical explanation” 

Mr Underhill cussed. “Son of a…ahem, pardon my French gentlemen. He is an ex-convict, served ten years for drugs”

Bard looked down. “And there we have it, fuck! Where does this Mog live?”

Mr Underhill turned the wheelchair around. “A minute, I have the address here” 

He disappeared into a shed and returned with surprising speed. He handed them a note and Thran stared at it. “Thank you Sir, you shouldn’t happen to know if this person is armed?” 

Mr Underhill sighed. “If I was you I would be wearing a flak vest, he is capable of just about anything I fear. Did his job well but he wasn’t the most sociable of guys. “ 

Bard nodded. “Alright, we better get going, thanks again” 

Mr Underhill did make a swift salute. “My pleasure” 

Thran grinned. “Are you online by the way, that gorgeous table over there would look great in our living room” 

Mr Underhill laughed. “Just google me, that table will be expensive though, the balance is a son of a bitch, I have some hard work ahead of me. “ 

Thran just snickered. “Money won’t be problem. Have a good day, you will hear from me” 

Mr Underhill nodded and they walked out of the yard. Bard grasped the car radio the moment they were inside of it and checked the name against the database. “Dispatch, send reinforcements to Smaug avenue 67, fifth floor, apartment 34. The suspect is a Gothmog Dale, age 41, white Caucasian male, six foot two with short dark hair and a tattoo of an eagle across his chest” 

They heard that dispatch answered and then they took off, Thran was looking nervous. “If there are drugs involved we could come up against just about anything.” 

Bard nodded. “Yes, we have wests in the trunk, and helmets too”

They careened into a parking place near the address and found the gear and put it on. Bard was feeling insecure. “Maybe we ought to wait for the swat team?!” 

Thran shrugged. “Yes, but we can enter the building right? I don’t like leaving the entrance unguarded” 

They walked towards the entrance when two police cars arrived, sirens blazing and four officers jumped out. Bard rolled his eyes, the entire block would have heard that. No way they would be able to take the guy by surprise. Thran took his hand, squeezed it swiftly. “It is alright, we won’t take any chances.” 

The four officers also wore wests and guns and they entered the building tactically. Thran stayed behind since he wasn’t trained for this and they ran up the stairs. They were entering the right floor when they heard a godawful racket coming from up ahead, someone was screaming and Bard cussed and kicked up the door to the corridor. They saw a woman laying on the floor and a kid stood by her side, bawling with fear. The woman was just knocked out but she had a nasty blue bruising forming around her right eye and Thran grasped his radio. “Dispatch, an ambulance to before mentioned address. One female, head trauma” 

The woman groaned. “Son of a bitch, he kicked me down!”

Bard shook her gently. “Ma’am, where did he go? Was it Mog?” 

The woman nodded, her eyes blurred with pain. “Yes, the goddamn bastard, he ran down that way” 

She pointed down the corridor and Bard was already running, he could hear someone heading down the second set of stairs and he ran as fast as he could. He suddenly had to stop though when several bullets flew by him and hit the concrete wall, releasing clouds of dust. He backed off and the suspect disappeared into a door which did lead into the second floor of the building. The two police officers were already right behind Bard and he wondered where Thran was. The corridor was dark, the lights were out and Bard swore under his breath, they couldn’t just run into the dark like that, unprotected. The culprit did carry a gun, possibly more than one and although the vests were good they couldn’t stop bullets from hitting the head or the neck or legs. The two police officers were panting. “Fuck, he is fast isn’t he?” 

Bard nodded. “Yes, and desperate, firing at an officer of the law is usually the last thing you wish to do, unless you plan on staying behind bars for a very long time.” 

They moved forth slowly, holding their flashlights tight and checking every corner, the corridor was long and it had a turn too. This building used to be a hotel years ago and there were doors everywhere. Bard was in front now and he was trying to determine whether or not they should just stop and wait when a door next to him opened abruptly and he was grasped in a headlock and dragged into the room. He lost the gun and felt steel pressing towards his body, it was Mog and he was obviously freaked out. “Stay back, or this cop gets it!”

Mog was heading towards the window, there were fire stairs outside and he opened the window and hauled Bard out, using him as a shield. The man was cussing and talking the whole time but nothing he said made any sense at all. It sounded like gibberish. He was obviously as high as a kite! Bard didn’t resist but he made himself heavy and hard to handle and Mog did drag him forth for a few meters and had to change his grip. That was when Bard heard a single gunshot and Mog let go of him, grasping his left shoulder. Bard saw Thran on the fire stairs, just a few meters ahead and Mog did what every mad possible killer does in such a situation, he dove over the rail as if he believed that he was some sort of superman. The man fell several meters, hit a garbage container and didn’t listen to Thran yelling that he had to stop or get shot again. Bard ran down the stairs and Thran was at his heels and they reached the ground just as Mog jumped out of the container with the elegance of a pregnant walrus. 

The man could run, in spite of having been shot and being high he would have given any athlete a run for the money but suddenly two squad cars did enter the street with lights on and the man turned on a dime and saw a possible escape. They were close to the great park and there were cabs there, the old horse drawn type. A few were parked along the street where it was shade and Mog ran desperately towards the first one. The two police cars had stopped, one was a K9 unit and the officer was releasing his dog, a massive German shepherd who looked very eager and more than ready to sink his teeth into some human flesh. 

Bard groaned, the fleeing man couldn’t possibly believe that he could escape using a cab? He didn’t listen to the shouts and rushed towards the first cab, a gig drawn by a very large grey horse which stood there with his head hanging low. The horse was tethered to a fire hydrant and the man grasped the tethers to free the horse and reached for the reins. Bard didn’t want to think of the damage this could cause, a wild man trying to escape the law in a carriage? And the poor horse, it would be in jeopardy too now. But Mog did make one crucial mistake, he probably assumed that all horses are kind and docile creatures and that they can be handled by just about anyone. He had never been more wrong in his life.

The moment Mog laid a hand on the reins to drag them with him into the cab the huge horse turned his massive head around with his ears flat back and he grasped the man with his long yellow front teeth, by the already injured shoulder. Bard and Thran could only look in a mixture of horror and disbelief as the horse lifted the man off his feet and shook him violently. Now the dog reached Mog too and grasped a hold of his inner left thigh and for a moment the two animals were part of a tug o war with the man as the rope. The dog won, the horse just let go of the man and shook its head up and down a few times, as if he was laughing. The dog was snarling and Mog was screaming like an air raid siren, the sound could be heard from blocks away. 

The K9 officer reached the man and told the dog to back off and before two seconds were gone Mog was cuffed and now he was wailing in pain and trying to come up with excuses. Bard and Thran walked over, rather casually. Mog wasn’t going anywhere now and the man was staring at the dog as if it was satan himself. The owner petted the huge male rather lovingly. “Good boy Huan, very good boy” 

Bard sat down onto his haunches and he was smiling, he had gotten shot at and been hauled off like a packet and he didn’t like it, at all. “Listen up Mog, here is the deal. You tell me all about the table and Mr Masters and I promise that Huan here won’t have your balls for dinner today, now, how does that sound?” 

Mog was writhing. “Fuck, morphine man, I need morphine, the nag, it bit me!”

Thran nodded. “Yes, and if you don’t start talking I am sure I can convince the cab driver of the necessity of letting us borrow his horse for a few moments more, he looks like he wants another taste, just like Huan” 

Mog whimpered. “It wasn’t my fault ya, it was Mr Underhill. He shouldn’t have sold that goddamn table, I hid my stash in it man, all I had. So I had to go and get it back, but that fat fucker caught me and I had to end him, he saw me!”

Bard sent Thran a tight smile. “And you hid it with the deer head, that was very clever Mog, but you returned now didn’t you?” 

The man nodded, sulking. “I didn’t get to find the table, it was in another room and there were someone in the hallway. I disengaged the alarms and came back yeah, found the table and my stash” 

Thran gestured towards one of the officers. “Put him in a car, under surveillance. He may need a doctor” 

Bard and Thran ran back upstairs and found Mog’s apartment and lo and behold, the table was there. It was very heavy so it was really a wonder that the man had managed to transport it without being seen by anyone but the table did in fact have some small wheels which could be pulled up when it was supposed to be stationary and it rolled fairly easily. On top of the table was several bags and Thran stared at them. “If I am not very wrong that is enough drugs to make an entire army high, Mog cannot expect anyone to believe that he keeps all this shit just to feed his own addiction” 

Bard shook his head. “Nope, but the mystery is solved, the culprit is apprehended and justice will be served.” 

Thran had to laugh. “Yes, Mr Masters did make a living on horses and now his killer got caught by one, that is pretty ironic wouldn’t you say? “ 

Bard chuckled too. “Yes, I think I will have a word with the boss of the state prison, I know they have this program where the inmates are to tame wild horses, I bet Mog will be thrilled to be a part of that” 

Thran gave Bard a friendly punch to the shoulder. “Oh love, that would be cruel, think of the poor animals” 

When they returned to the station Thor was in a very good mood, the case had been solved in record speed and the murderer was behind bars already. He was even humming as he gave the two men the rest of the day off. Bard and Thran couldn’t believe their own luck and immediately went to eat dinner at a very expensive restaurant. Mog got life in jail, he wouldn’t return to the outside world ever and good riddance. Thran did buy the fish table from Mr Underhill and it did look marvellous when it was finished, it fitted their living room perfectly. The only one not very happy was Mrs Masters when she discovered that there was something written with very small letters in the marriage contract and now she was on bare ground without anything at all of her husband’s money. A very skilled lawyer had managed to convince the state judge of the wisdom in granting everyone Mr Masters had sued a fat compensation and thus there was very little left. So the suing days were over, Mrs Masters did find herself a new sugar daddy after just a month and was promptly dumped two weeks later when said sugar daddy found a very pretty twenty year old with fake boobs and an ever more fake smile. Sometimes fate does walk in mysterious ways.


	2. Every rose has its thorn...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A child has been murdered at a beauty pageant, and the rumours are flying, could some sick pervert be behind it? When Thran and Bard dig into this case they discover something which is gonna shock even seasoned detectives...

Chapter two: Every rose has its thorn

Bard did feel it the moment they entered the car, Thran was sending off “those” vibes and he knew exactly what they were. The tall blonde was staring out of the window and his jaw was clenched and his expression one of intense discomfort. Bard knew Thran by now and this was one of those things which really affected his husband. Heck, it affected them all, no wonder really. It was the most terrible thing of all. They drove towards the scene in a convoy of squad cars and they used the lights and the sirens for all they were worth, the cars on the roads did swerve to the side to let the police through and Bard had to concentrate on keeping the powerful cruiser on the road. The car was brand new and the engine capable of pushing it up to frightening speeds. Thran didn’t say a word, he had been silent since Thor came rushing into the office, bearing the news they really didn’t want, a murder just on the outskirts of the city. Bard had hoped for a few peaceful days since it was summer and very warm, they had planned upon taking the kids to a local lake for a few days of bathing and fun and he would hate it if he had to disappoint them. 

The cars careened into the parking lot in front of the Golden Crane hotel, it was owned by Chinese immigrants and it was among the oldest ones in the city. The huge building had been refurnished several times and now it was regarded as a good hotel and conference centre, its reputation did ensure its continued survival for there was a stiff competition between the hotels. Bard sighed when he saw the many cars which already had gathered there, reporters and god knew what else. They descended upon a scene of tragedy like ravenous vultures from above and he felt sick. The huge sign in front of the hotel told everyone what the place did host this week. “Welcome to the tenth annual state beauty pageant” 

Bard rolled his eyes, he knew what he would see and Thran probably shared his thoughts. They parked and walked inn, everybody were gathered in one of the large halls and there were guards there. Bard heard the sounds of crying children and hysterical women and Thran was a bit pale. “This is filth!”

Bard stared at his husband with a slight feeling of shock, he had never heard Thran make such crass statements before? Thran pointed at one of the posters, it showed a girl of perhaps four or five and she was wearing a costume better suited for a prostitute than a kid and she was wearing full makeup and her posture was one intended to seduce. “These kids lose their childhood, doesn’t the parents see this?” 

Bard sighed, “No, they see crowns and tiaras and the chance of fifteen minutes of worthless fame” 

One of the hotel guards met them, the police was waiting to be allowed entrance since Judith had arrived already and needed to see the body before it was moved or touched in any way. Bard and Thran and Elisa were among the first to be allowed entrance to the basement and they walked down the stairs with a feeling of nausea. This was all just so very wrong. The room was not very large and it was extremely hot since the boiler used to heat the rooms were placed there and it hadn’t been switched off for the summer since the system was old and needed it for heating bathwater too. 

Bard knew that the kid had been reported missing three hours before she was found, an Amber alert had been issued to all police units and the news had been all over it. Some had been sure that some sick pervert had kidnapped the girl and now those rumours would spread even faster. Judith was grim, her face stiff and her eyes did shoot lightening. She pulled her gloves off and nodded to the two CSI technicians who had arrived with her. “You can move her now guys, I have seen all I can here. The poor thing…she was just six” 

Bard had to turn around, it was the janitor who had discovered the body, some rooms had complained about not getting enough hot water and the reason was obvious. The body had been jammed in between the boiler and the wall and several valves had been pushed into their closed position by the culprit, just to get room to shove the body inn there. Thran was pale and Bard tried not to look at the body, the eyes were open and revealed a sort of innocent disbelief and shock which made his stomach churn. Judith sighed and closed her equipment box, she looked as if she was about to cry. “I have seen so much but goddamn it, this always gets to me, always!” 

Thran touched her shoulder gently. “You wouldn’t have been human if you didn’t. It shows you are normal, and a good person” 

Judith just smiled stiffly and walked off and Elisa saw that the technicians started to pull the body out, they dusted the valves for fingerprints first and Thran tried to be professional. “Shoving a body into that tight space takes strength, and either determination or desperation.” 

Bard nodded. “I agree on that, but why there? The janitor saw the body the moment he entered the room, the man is supposedly in shock still” 

Thran tilted his head. “Yes, one could almost believe that the killer wanted the body to be found quickly?” 

Bard took a deep breath. “Right, first things first. The mother of the deceased is waiting, tenth floor, room 1018. Her name is Miranda Smith and the girl is Ianda Smith Jerkins, age six, two times beauty queen and infamous for winning almost every competition she entered” 

Thran almost sneered. “These pageants are just…revolting. Mothers trying to gain fame through their kids, families spending all their money on something which just breeds sick body images and a loss of self-esteem?” 

Bard had to smile. “I agree, whole heartedly.” 

Elisa had not spoken much, she was obviously unwell and she sort of hurried out of the basement. Bard caught up with her. “If this affects you just tell me, I can give you the task of interviewing the staff, see if they have seen anything odd, strangers, abnormalities of any kind”

Elisa swallowed and nodded. “I am sorry, it is just that…When I was six mom wanted me to participate in a pageant and I was so excited and believed that it was gonna be fun. But the judges didn’t even look at me and kept criticizing my skin colour and the fact that I was fat. But I had normal weight for my age. I never forgot it, but now I of course know that it was because I am a native” 

Bard made a grimace. “I am very sorry” 

Thran stared at her. “Do the interviews Elisa, we can deal with the mom” 

Elisa did look relieved and she took off and they found the elevators. The entire hotel was being searched from roof to basement, in case the culprit still was in there. The room was rather large and the woman who sat heartbroken in a couch appeared to be rather well off, she wasn’t a working class woman, that was for sure. Bard saw that her shoes were the kind you have to order in advance and her slacks and blouse were silk. She was weeping and her eyes puffy and red and yet she did look beautiful and it was a very natural beauty, a rather sharp contrast with what the whole pageant thing was about. Bard had seen drag queens who looked way more natural than some of the kids who participated in these competitions. Bard cleared his throat. “Mrs Smith? I am Bard Bowman, I am in charge of the investigation.”

Mrs Smith gasped and she wiped her face. “Oh Gods, I cannot believe it is true, my Ianda, my precious girl.” 

Thran did sit down, a couple of other women were there too, one was rather alike Mrs Smith and had to be her sister and the other one was a very sophisticated looking woman wearing a business suit. She was obviously shaken and her hands were trembling. “Could you please tell me what happened today? Use your own words, and everything is important, take us through it.” 

Mrs Smith closed her eyes. “We went to breakfast as usual, Ianda was going to compete in the second rounds this evening and she had to get her hair done in time so we had to be finished early. After that we did go to the hair dresser and I told her to wait in our room for I had to go to the officials and pay the entrance fee. There had been some problems with the banks and I had to run around the entire place trying to find an ATM machine.” 

Bard nodded. “We noticed, there has been computer problems everywhere, some sort of glitch in the system” 

Mrs Smith did try to smile, she was trying to be brave but failed. “I spent half an hour trying to get the money and when I did I ran back and paid and then I returned to the room only to find it empty, Ianda would never have left with anyone she didn’t know, she is such a very smart girl and she knows that strangers can be dangerous” 

Thran caught Bards gaze with an almost imperceptible nod. Mrs Smith had said is, not was, a killer would speak of the victim in the past sense. She was not the one behind this. Bard looked at the other two women there. “And you ladies are?” 

The one who looked like Mrs Smith had been weeping and she was a bit hoarse. “I am Jeanine, Miranda’s sister. I was in town for a congress and hurried here when I heard that Ianda was missing, I…” 

She gasped and there was something very dark in her eyes. “These pageants are so wrong, so very wrong! And now someone has…murdered my niece!”

The other woman sighed and closer her eyes. “I am a friend of Miranda, I came with her and Ianda to this pageant as a favour, Miranda needed someone to tape Ianda’s performance and I know how to use a camera since I used to work for a TV station. Now I am a secretary to Miranda’s husband Tommy” 

Thran frowned. “Is he Ianda’s dad?” 

Miranda shook her head, “No, that was my ex Fred, we got divorced when Ianda was one, we just…we didn’t have much in common and we did separate very peacefully. He has her one weekend each month” 

Jeanine nodded. “Yes, she and Fred were just not meant to be, he was too focused on his career but Tommy loves Ianda like his own and he is really great with her” 

Thran nodded. “So, Ianda has won several crowns, and she is a favourite here, do you think that anyone in the pageant society could be behind this?” 

Miranda shook her head. “This whole pageant thing is…was her idea, she wanted to try and I was too weak and gave inn. But it is such a vicious society, you wouldn’t believe the hatred, the bigotry and the jealousy one can encounter on a daily business” 

Bard cocked his head. “I have understood that some mothers are a bit competitive yes” 

Miranda rolled her eyes. “Not just the mothers, believe me. In some cases it is the moms who sort of push their kids into this and demand that they win, but I have seen that the kids are just as bad, if not worse. They get such terrible attitudes from this, all that matters is winning, if the child protective services knew of the things which I have seen going on there would be an uproar” 

Thran did look a bit angry. “And yet you let Ianda participate?” 

Miranda nodded, her shoulders slumped forward. “Yes, because I expected her to lose. We are doing well, we have money and she will go to a top school and have all that she wants and I thought that this may teach her a little about life, and how to deal with setbacks and disappointments but she was good at it, in fact Ianda is among those who really enjoy performing and of course the judges notice that and gives her points for it” 

Bard had to scoff. “So you did this expecting her to fail?!”

Miranda closed her eyes. “Does that make me a terrible mom? I just wanted her to be prepared for life, to be more than those spoiled kids who never has faced resistance at all. And now…Oh Gods!”

Miranda broke down in tears again and her sister did scoot over and embraced her. Thran bit his lower lip. “So, none of you have noticed anything out of the ordinary? Nobody has tried to contact you, no fan letters, no phone calls?” 

Miranda dried her tears. “No, some of the girls have fans, but I have tried to avoid that for Ianda, she doesn’t need that sort of twisted attention.” 

Bard looked at the sister. “And you haven’t seen anything?” 

Jeanine shook her head. “No. but…” 

Bard looked at her. “Yes?” 

Jeanine made a grimace. “When I arrived I did notice that there were a lot of workers here, carrying stuff, tarp, buckets and even wheel barrels? I am sure you already know but…” 

Bard knew what she was thinking, it was easy to hide a small body in building material. “Good thinking ma’am, we will check it out” 

Thran got up. “The hotel manager has probably found the surveillance videos from earlier today, let’s go and pay him a visit.” 

Miranda was sobbing. “Please, find the one who did this to my baby, I cannot stand the thought of it happening to anyone else…” 

Bard tried to smile but his face was stiff. “We will do our best, and our deepest condolences”

Thran almost dragged Bard into the hallway, he was still pissed off. “These goddamn freak shows are like beacons for perverts, I am sure of it, some sick bastard killed the kid!” 

Bard laid a hand on Thran’s shoulders, the muscles were tense. “Let us not jump to conclusions before we have all the facts now shall we?” 

Thran sighed. “You are right, I was overreacting, but this makes me…It is just so terrible!”

Bard nodded and squeezed his hand, smiling. “Come, the manager is waiting” 

The hotel manager turned out to be a Caucasian man with a receding hairline, a bit of a belly and a nervous twitch around his eyes. He was in obvious despair due to this terrible incident and he was wiping the sweat of his face all the time. Bard did present them and the man bowed his head. “I am Jonathan Bree, I have run this hotel for Mr and Mrs Ling for fifteen years and not once, not once have we had a serious crime happening here. Oh our reputation will plummet, we may be heading for bankruptcy.!”

Thran frowned. “A child has died and you worry about money?!”

Mr Bree did wipe his forehead again, the handkerchief looked as if it was soaked already. “I am sorry, but…it is my livelihood, it is all I know” 

Bard sighed. “So, the surveillance videos?”

Mr Bree nodded and opened the door into a room with screens and a couple of guys sat there watching the live feed from the restaurant and the main hall. They saw the two men enter and turned on a couple of screens. “This is all that was taped from six o clock this morning until the kid was found” 

Bard sat down and Thran leaned onto his shoulder, staring at the screen. They saw several elevators, some stairs and the restaurant and the main hall plus the hotel lobby. Bard did fast forward the tapes until they saw Mrs Smith enter the restaurant with the girl, they did leave half an hour later and then they saw that both entered the elevator and returned to the room. Five minutes after that the mom returned to the elevators and left the lobby after having spoken to the man behind the desk, apparently asking for the nearest bank or ATM machine. Twenty nine minutes after that she did reappear and disappeared into the main hall, there were no holes in her story at all. They then stared at the elevator tapes again, after the mom left to get money, and for the first twenty minutes they saw just other guests entering and leaving and most of them together with several others and many were kids. Just a few minutes before Mrs Smith did take the elevator back to the tenth floor both investigators did freeze up, Ianda did enter the elevator and she had something in her hand, it wasn’t large but it was obviously rather soft and she was clutching it close to her chest. 

The girl did stare at the camera once and she did look determined, her lower jaw shot forward. Then the doors opened at the sixth floor and someone almost stepped into the elevator but turned around and Ianda did speak to whoever it was. The doors shut and she did go down to the second floor before she left the elevator and was out of it for about four minutes. When she returned she didn’t have the object in her hand and she was riding back up towards the tenth floor but at the sixth floor the elevator stopped and the doors opened, someone entered but with the back to the camera, almost hiding in the corner so all they saw was the top of a head. Ianda was obviously asking a question and the person seemed to be gesturing, then the elevator stopped at the seventh floor and now both left it. Bard stared at Thran and his eyes were huge, “Who is that?” 

Thran stared at the other tapes, none of them did show the corridors and Ianda didn’t appear on any other of the surveillance videos after that and Thran sighed. “That person knows the hotel, and where all the cameras are.”

Bard nodded “Let us take the tapes to the station, I will ask Thor to send an expert in image technology over”

Thran was tense and Bard did lean over and transferred all the data to a memory stick. He felt that the hand resting on his shoulder was like a claw. They returned to the lobby and Bard called Thor who promised to get someone who could take a look at the tapes when they returned. Elisa was done with the interviews and Bard saw that she was talking to the clerk, the man was obviously upset. She smiled at them but the smile was more of a grimace really. “They have had workers scurrying in and out of the hotel the entire morning, the aircondition system broke down last night and had to be fixed and several rooms got no warm water.” 

Bard started to suspect that this hotel was more run down than anyone could guess after all. “So, the interviews?” 

Elisa rolled her eyes. “I did interview some, but they are already at it again, practicing and rehearsing, as if nothing has happened, will you believe it? I spoke to the judges and the one in charge of the pageant but none of the moms had time for me. They were pissed that they were being held back and unable to tend to their little princesses” 

Elisa said the last word with so much vitriol it was little doubt that she absolutely hated this. Bard took a deep breath. “Right, well, maybe we will be in better luck then, we have to find out if any of the mom’s here have seen something out of the ordinary, or the kids for that sake” 

Elisa looked as if she was about to suck a very sour lemon. “Good luck, those….ladies will not bother with anything except their chances of winning!”

Bard opened the door into the great hall. Several girls ranging from four to seven stood in line waiting for their stage rehearsal and one girls was on stage now, wearing a sort of cowgirl costume with a skirt which barely covered the bottom and a top which had less fabric than an average handkerchief. She was strutting around in high heeled boots while swinging a flag and the mom was standing in the middle of the floor hollering. “More energy Daisy, lift your legs, don’t drag them like an old cow!”

The girl did try, and then she sort of turned around and stuck out her tongue while leaning forward, butt sticking out in the air. Bard did blink, he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. “Thran is that girl…” 

Thran sounded a bit aspirated. “Twerking, yes, oh God.” 

Bard swallowed. “If I catch Tilda or Sigrid doing that before they are ready for the retirement home I will smack their bottoms into next Thursday, I swear to the lord!”

The mother was swaying her hips too, screaming. “More, pump it baby, just like Miley, stick your tongue out!”

Thran closed his eyes and appeared to be praying and Bard sort of snapped. He grasped a small hammer which lay on the table the judges would use and slammed it into the wood so hard everybody just jumped and stared with disbelief. Some of the women there did notice that these two men were tall and very handsome and Bard did see the predator awaken in several of the gazes which landed on them. He held up his badge. “Listen, we have some questions for you ladies and would greatly appreciate if you could answer them, it would be too bad if we had to shut this whole show down!”

One of the moms did scoff. “Alright, but be quick. We need to practice” 

Thran frowned, “A child has died most horribly and you don’t even seem to be shocked?” 

The woman just grimaced. “Ianda was such a pampered brat, she had it coming. Now we others have a chance again, finally!”

Bard almost gaped but closed his mouth. Several of the other women there did appear to share that woman’s attitude for there were mumbling heard from several and it sounded as if they all agreed, wholeheartedly. Bard did swallow, hard. “So first things first, have anyone been approached by any strangers? “ 

Heads were shaken. “Na-ah, the hotel has security, nobody is let in who doesn’t belong here!”

A very fat woman wearing what could only be described as a fashion disaster was speaking, her arms folded over her chest. Bard had to stare, she had to be wearing ship sails for a bra for damn, the size of her chest? Thran was sending them a very harsh glare. “So in reality everyone of you could be behind this, to get a rival moved out of the way?” 

The women were gaping and one did get up, she was pointing at them. “If you want to know who could have done this ask Dina Butterdale, she loathed Ianda since Ianda won when in reality her daughter Cindy ought to have been the winner.”

Thran cocked his head. “And this Dina Butterdale, where is she?” 

Several heads were turning, faces were frowning and one of the women, a tall blonde with a BMI way under the skinny limit made a sour pout. “Have no idea, she is here this week for she has volunteered to help arranging the pageant but she was supposed to come to me this morning and help me stitch together Sandra’s costume but she never showed.”

Thran frowned. “Her daughter isn’t here?” 

Heads were being shaken. “No, Cindy has got the measles, couldn’t come, just silly really for a little sickness has never harmed anyone but the rules are so goddamn strict” 

Bard rolled his eyes, a little sickness…When he was a kid he knew a boy in his class who had lost five siblings because of measles, it was not just a little sickness but a killer of children but people seemed to have forgotten about that. “So Mrs Butterdale isn’t here?” 

The blonde shrugged. “Nobody’s seen her since before breakfast, she was helping Miss Buxley here prepare her products” 

A blonde woman wearing a tight blue dress waved her hand from the back of the room. She was standing by a table filled with boxes and jars and the two walked over. “I am Miss Camille Buxley, I represent the “Charming and flawless” make up brand. I sell you see” 

Bard saw that the make up on the table ranged from foundation to mascara and even some very expensive skin creams. And all this for kids? He lifted a jar, the price made him almost drop it. “So this is aimed at the moms?” 

Miss Buxley giggled. “Of course not silly, this is all about the girls. This here for example…”   
She held up a jar of foundation. “Is perfect for creating a skin like porcelain, no birthmarks, no acne, not even a freckle. We sell a lot of it, the firm is going to turn this into a great success” 

Bard swallowed. “Bottles of skin cream at two hundred dollars a jar? For a kid?”

The woman just laughed. “Oh that is nothing, many moms spend thousands of dollars on porcelain veneers for the teeth, chemical peeling, orthopaedic shoes, treatments, diets, even skin bleaching. A few hundred bucks for a cream is cheap darling”

Thran did look like he was about to retch. “And you don’t feel bad being a part of a business like this?” 

Miss Buxley did look at him over her glasses, she was more than a little round and her face was rather sweet. She appeared to be near sighted and the glasses were like coke bottles. “No, if I wasn’t here selling this stuff someone else would be, the market demands it and we supply the masses with what they want. That is capitalism dear” 

Bard tried to think. “Miss Butterdale did help you?” 

Miss Buxley did nod, she moved a few jars. “Oh yes, if she has said she’ll do it she will, she did show up being her usual delightful self. That woman could have made fresh milk turn sour, believe me. She was so pissed that Cindy wasn’t allowed to participate this year” 

Thran crossed his arms and noticed that many of the women there were staring at his posterior with hungry gazes. He shuddered. “Why was that?”

The saleswoman did lower her voice, and she did look a bit gleeful. “Oh you see, she had discovered that Mr Button was going to be among the judges and he has a particular taste so she had prepared Cindy rather well. She was sure Cindy would win this time for Ianda lacked that little extra” 

Thran was frowning, his eyes told them both of great disbelief. “And by a little extra you mean?”

Miss Buxley was almost whispering now. “Do not tell anyone but she had given Cindy hormones, a little extra, see?”

She pressed her chest forward and shook her body so her boobs were moving and Bard felt sick. “Oh lord, she gave her kid hormones? How old is Cindy?”

Miss Buxley tilted her head. “Seven, going on eight so this was her last chance in this class. Next year she will have to compete against girls up to thirteen and they always win. You know, lamb chops. The judges do love a little Lolita. “

Bard had to swallow hard, he felt the taste of bile in his mouth and Thran hurried. “So, Miss Butterdale did show up when she was supposed to but after that nobody has seen her?”

Everybody nodded and Bard took a deep breath. “Now that is suspicious if you ask me, does anyone have a picture of Miss Butterdale?” 

One of the moms came forth with a sort of group photo, many women were staring into the camera grinning but looking as if they wanted to murder the one standing next to them. “It is the one over to the left, with the grey hair” 

Bard looked at the picture, the woman was rather petite and slender but she appeared to be used to hard work for she had worn hands. “I will need this picture” 

The woman just shrugged. “Keep it, I have no use for it. Are you done now?” 

Thran sighed and nodded. “We are, does anyone know what room Miss Butterdale lives in?” 

Miss Buxley did nod. “Room 635 I think” 

Thran smiled at her and the woman giggled and Bard rolled his eyes. They walked back towards the elevators after having gotten a universal card which opened every door there and pressed the button after having entered. Bard felt how upset Thran was and embraced him, kissing him gently. Thran answered the kiss and they were still locked in an embrace as the doors opened. A tall woman wearing a ghastly feather boa and tights so tight they appeared to be a part of her skin stared at them and slammed her hands in front of the eyes of a girl of perhaps six years of age. She was wearing a miniscule polka dotted bikini with a padded top, thick makeup and high heels. “Perverts!”

The door closed again and Thran just growled. “Thanks the same!”

The room of Ms Butterdale was so tidy it appeared that nobody lived there but some clothes lay in a pile on the bead and a suitcase stood on the floor. Thran stared at the room, tried to catch a glimpse of who Miss Butterdale was. The suitcase was almost empty but there were some lingerie in it and a small box containing some jewellery. On the table there was a picture of a girl, she did look very sweet and she didn’t wear any make up at all, she was smiling towards the camera, holding a tiny kitten. In a pocket inside of the suitcase there was a small teddy bear and a folded up diploma, for most pretty baby at the county fair. Thran swallowed. “She loves her daughter fiercely, the kid is the most important thing to her. Look, the picture is placed neatly on the table while her own stuff is just tossed onto the bed” 

Bard swallowed. “Do you think she can be the one?”

Thran nodded. “Yes, believe it or not. A woman like this lives not for her children but through them, I bet she has met many obstacles in her life, perhaps she never has known real joy and love and she wants to make sure that her daughter gets everything she never had. Acceptance, admiration, wealth. And to some nothing may stand in the way of just that” 

Bard frowned and stared at the picture. “I cannot remember having seen her on the surveillance videos?”

Thran nodded. “Neither did I? We’ll get the expert to check them for us” 

They returned to the lobby after having told the staff that the room of Ms Butterdale was to remain untouched until further notice. Elisa had already returned to the station and the CSI technicians were done dusting for fingerprints and looking for particles or anything else which could offer a clue. The hotel was being left now and Bard did put out a wanted notice for Ms Butterdale, he hoped that she could be found soon. Disappearing out of a hotel like that was more than a little suspicious when a murder had happened.   
They arrived at the station and Bard parked the car, he felt that a headache was creeping in on him and he sighed and rubbed his forehead. Thran delivered the memory stick to Thor who had a very worried expression on his face, nobody needed to ask why. This was the kind of case which could trigger a public panic and he would probably have a hard time keeping the reporters at bay. Judith seemed to have a sixth sense telling her when the investigators returned for Bard got a text from her the moment he sat down at his desk and he groaned and turned to Thran who was trying to force a cup of the absolutely ghastly coffee brewed by the office machine down his throat. It did look like tar and judging from his expression it did taste like tar too. “Judith texted me, are you coming?” 

Thran sighed and put the cup down. “No reason to delay this, let’s go” 

They walked down the stairs to the basement and entered the new morgue, the rooms did look like an operating theatre at a hospital and Judith was standing by a row of wash basins, cleaning her hands. She smiled at them but the smile was very thin and her eyes were dark. “There you are, I have done the preliminary examination of the body and I do have a cause of death” 

Bard wetted his lips. “Yes?” 

Judith took up a sheet of paper, a body was drawn onto it, a sort of standard outline of a child’s torso and she had made markings on it. She pointed at them, her expression one of almost disbelief. “This was done in a hurry, probably in desperation. It wasn’t premeditated at all. “ 

She pointed her pen at the head. “The cause of death was here, the child’s temple was hit by something rather small but hard and at high velocity. It fractured the skull and caused a bleeding between the brain and the skull. Then the side of her neck was struck again, with the same object, and it did pierce the skin and ruptured the neck artery, the girl did bleed out within ninety seconds.”

Bard swallowed hard. “What sort of object are we talking about?”

Judith sort of shrugged. “I have no clue, it is not sharp, but hard, and I cannot wrap my head around the shape. It is no weapon, that is for sure. This was something which was just there and the killer just grasped it. “ 

Thran did look intrigued. “What shape are we talking about?”

Judith did grasp a sheet of paper and a marker and drew onto it. “This, it is like a small U or a horseshoe, the size of a keyboard tab” 

Bard tried to wrap his head around it but failed to make any sense out of it. What the heck could it be? Thran grasped the drawing and turned it around, staring at it, then he grew pale and he stared at Bard with huge eyes “ Folks, I know what this is!”

Judith gaped. “Educate us, please!”

Thran nodded and put the drawing down. “It is a heel, from a shoe, a stiletto.”

Judith made a grimace. “Oh damnation, why didn’t I see that? Gaahd, it is so obvious!”

Bard was blinking. “ Uh, a shoe! Piercing the artery?!”

Judith nodded. “Believe me, it is very possible, when I was a student I worked at an E.R for a few months and we received this woman with a stiletto stuck on her face, the heel had pierced her cheek, she and a friend had fought over some guy and the friend had smacked her with the shoe, tiny skinny girl but more than strong enough.” 

Thran swallowed. “The killer is a woman then, and we have a hotel filled with them, and how many of them are wearing high heels?”

Bard rolled his eyes. “Eighty percent? But that friend of Mrs Smith? She was wearing some very elegant high heels? With red soles?”

Thran nodded. “I did notice them, they are expensive as fuck and no, I don’t think she did it, unless she has several pairs stacked into her purse or something. There must have been a lot of blood, as a matter of fact a heck of a lot of it and where is it?”

Bard waved a finger. “Yes, exactly! Where? The entire hotel was searched, roof to basement” 

Judith sort of frowned. “Was every room searched?” 

Thran sighed. “No, not the rooms with guests?” 

She made a grimace. “I bet that the blood is in one of the rooms, and the culprit will flee before the staff has a chance to discover it”

Thran shrugged. “But that person will be exposed then, and I still think it may be Ms Butterdale. But there is something about it I just cannot understand, I was thinking about it in the car on the way back” 

Judith tilted her head. “Spill it dear, what were you pondering about?”

The profiler made a sort of apologetic grimace. “Uh, well, like I said back at the hotel, Ms Butterdale do love her daughter, there is no doubt about it. She sets her kid above herself, and that makes her a potential killer but I just cannot make sense of what that saleswoman said. A grown woman would certainly know that hormones to a kid that young are very dangerous? I cannot see a devoted mother doing that to her seven year old” 

Bard made a grimace. “There are girls as young as nine now who start their periods, it is the overweight problem and the hormones in everything out there” 

He sighed, he had never had to have “that” conversation with Sigrid for Jean took care of it but they would soon have to prepare Tilda for that part of life and he wasn’t really looking forward to it. Bard had taken the little talk with Bain already for he didn’t think that his former mother in law understood the problems of a growing lad the way he did. Judith tilted her head. “She gave her daughter hormones? Why?”

Thran made a gesture towards Judith’s assets. “Ah, to increase…hmmm, apparently the judges are sick old perverts” 

Judith shook her head. “Oh God, that whole pageant thing, it is like a lunch buffet for twisted people. But I see where you are going Thran, any woman would know that it is very risky to intervene with the natural maturation of a girl.”

Thran nodded. “So why did she?” 

Bard frowned. “Ah, do we know for a fact that she did? What if it was just something she said? Ms Buxley is after all just a saleswoman, not a doctor. And who knows what these moms say to each other, it could be something she said just to intimidate her opponents?” 

Judith sighed. “Yes, it is a dog eat dog world out there and the competition within those societies is terrible, you would think that lives were at stake, not just a small amount of money and a title. Most of the families lose a lot of money, the prizes do not pay for the expenses at all” 

She stared at the table where the body of the dead girl lay. “I will go over her more thoroughly now, even open her up. So see you guys later. But ask the hotel staff to go through every room. There is at least three litres of blood in there somewhere” 

Bard grasped his phone and made a call to the hotel managed the moment he left the morgue, the man did sound as if he was receiving his own death sentence but promised to send the staff through every room, disguising it as an ordinary check up of the air vents.   
Thran had a faraway look in his eyes and Bard gave him a soft punch. “What is it that you are thinking about now.?”

Thran grinned, “Lunch, and luxury shoes” 

Bard frowned and Thran sort of scoffed. “Seriously, I am starved. But the heel strike, it don’t think it was from a shoe being held and then used as a weapon.”

Bard wondered how the brain of the tall blonde worked at times, he could think about so many things at the same time. “Why?” 

Thran made a grimace and spread his arms. “I don’t really know, but something about it felt wrong, one punch to the temple, then one to the neck, the girl would have gone down with the first one, why two? Unless they happened very fast, almost simultaneously, just pow pow and boom you are dead”

Bard stared at Thran. “She wasn’t hit, she was kicked!”

Thran nodded. “Yes, by someone who knows how to deliver a lethal kick, even without high heels.”

Both the men stared at each other and both said the same thing. “A martial artist!”

They sort of rushed into the office where Thor was going through the tapes with the expert he had gotten hold of, the man was rather young with a very innocent look upon his face and he wore a t shirt with a picture of the starship enterprise but the text over the image said Star Wars and the text under it said “Find one mistake” Thor looked up. “We have started, Frodo here thinks he could be onto something”

Bard leaned forward, staring at the computer screen. The young man was working with a sort of very specialized keyboard and he had joysticks and all sorts of equipment there. “Really?”

Frodo nodded. “Yes, here, see, the girl is in the elevator, she is holding something in her hand, and someone is about to enter the elevator but steps back.”

Everybody stared at the screen, they couldn’t see the person due to the angle of the camera but now Frodo was enhancing the reflection of the person in the brushed steel backwall of the elevator. “This brushed steel is crap, it distorts the image but we can see some things”   
Bard frowned, the sort of blurry splotch of colours did reveal…two people? “It is two persons?”

Frodo nodded. “Yes, a woman in front, the one who almost stepped into the elevator and one behind her, from what I can see she is smaller and her hair is white or grey. The one in front is very dark”

Thran’s eyes got narrow. “Ms Butterdale...”

Thor nodded. “Elisa has briefed me, it could be her yes” 

Frodo changed the view. “Here comes the interesting part, the person who steps into the elevator and leaves it with Ianda is the same person who almost entered just a few minutes earlier but this time she is alone”

Thran frowned. “Are you sure?” 

Frodo nodded, and the screen was filled with lines and numbers and stuff, it made Bard feel dizzy. “Yes, same height, same body shape, the same movements. And, I have one rather important discovery”

He turned a wheel and the colours of the image did change, became rather like those of a painting made by Van Gogh. “Her hair, she is wearing a wig and it’s not a very expensive one, it is a sort of nylon I think” 

Thran did look a bit fascinated. “How can you tell?”

The image expert shrugged. “It reflects light in a different manner than real human hair” 

Bard leaned even closer to the screen. “So, the woman who almost enters the elevator with another person and then enters it and leaves with Ianda is a woman wearing a dark wig, wearing…green?”

Frodo nodded. “A green blouse of a sort and probably beige pants.”

The two investigators stared at each other, that didn’t exactly narrow it down. Thor sighed. “Ianda was murdered somewhere in that hotel and we need to find that room, before we can do anything more.”

Thran was fidgeting with his pen. “They leave on the seventh floor, that woman rode the elevator from the sixth floor where she left that other person, possibly Ms Butterdale behind. I am confused”

Bard nodded. “So am I, what is going on?”

Thor made a grimace. “We need to find the crime scene!”

Frodo tilted his head, “I have enhanced the images of the thing in Ianda’s hand. It is a sort of scarf or some other piece of fabric and it looks like pure silk” 

Thor mumbled. “That means something, you need to find out what that was.” 

Bard sighed. “We have to return to the hotel?” 

Thor nodded. “Yes, go have a swift lunch and then return. We need to get this sorted out asap, there are rumours flying like fucking UFO’s right now.”

Thran sighed and Bard made a grimace, he didn’t feel like returning to that place but knew he had to. The phone called, so suddenly that all three of them jumped and Bard answered, a bit shaken. “Yes?”

The voice of Judith could be heard loud and clear. “Guys, I have news. I found fibres in the wound on the neck, leather. It was dyed blue and it was very nice leather too, the expensive sort.” 

Bard sighed. “We are looking for a blue stiletto? Of the pricy kind?”

Judith was chuckling” Bingo, and not just any kind. That particular colour is only used by one shoe designer, Akim Peterson, he is the new Jimmy Cho, a rising star in the designer industry. Those shoes cost a fortune”

Bard frowned. “Ah, what are we missing here? None of the moms there are that rich? I mean, Mrs Smith is well off but shoes like that?!”

Judith hadn’t hung up, yet. “Bard, those are not the sort of shoes a married woman would wear, not even to show off her wealth. These are what I refer to as “Take me, I am not cheap and worth it but watch your bank account” kind of shoes”

Thor had to chuckle. “The shoes of a gold digger?” 

Judith answered. “Exactly!”

Than frowned. “That friend of Mrs Smith, she wasn’t married? And rather well off too?”

Bard shook his head “I don’t think so, she was way too old, no, I don’t think we are looking for a cougar here”

Thor waved his arms. “Go, get some food and find that crime scene, now!”

Judith did hang up and Bard sighed, the idea of food wasn’t that tempting but his stomach did hurt and he knew he had eaten way too little for breakfast. He nodded at Thran. “Pete’s corner?”

Thran nodded back, with a wry grin. “Pete’s corner it is”

It was a small restaurant just a stone throw from the station and it was rather old but popular because the guy running it had no idea of how much people really eat so he made the portions humongous while charging very little. How he had survived in the business for almost twenty years were anybody’s guess but the rumours said that he was living off money his mother had left him. There could be some truth in it for the restaurant should have headed for bankruptcy years ago.   
It was the normal patrons who occupied it, local office workers, some police officers and some students from the near by college. Pete saw the two and grinned widely. “Mr Bowman, Mr Oropherson, the usual?”

Both nodded and sat down and Bard added. “And two cups of coffee and make it black and strong, we do need it!”

The usual was a sort of huge baguette with all sorts of filling and spices and if anyone had counted the calories in the thing the result would have been astronomical but Bard didn’t care. It was delicious, it was enough food to make two grown men more than full and it was cheap. They both got a steaming hot baguette each and attacked like two starved lions released into the colosseum, tearing into the condemned. The coffee was just the way Bard had wanted it, so black it looked like old engine oil and so strong you almost could make a spoon stand on end in it. They didn’t speak as they ate, it was a sort of silent agreement. They shouldn’t ruin this precious break with work, this was their short time off and both just enjoyed the food. This day Pete had used boiled eggs, seafood, mayonnaise and lettuce plus salted bacon cut into thin slices and it was just mouth watering. Bard was sure that if there was food in heaven this was what it would be like. It was a damn thing that humans only had one stomach, it was in moments like this it would have been grand to have four like a cow. 

As the two investigators were having lunch the employees at the hotel were going through the rooms, one floor at the time. There weren’t that many working there so everybody had their hands full and the hotel was relatively full too so the excuse was needed. Everybody had seen the workers so they knew that something was off and most swallowed the little white lie. The workers did check the vents and told people that something could have been wrong with the air flow and that they needed to make sure that none of the guests had to pay for a room which wasn’t up to standard. The workers were all afraid, none wanted to find the spot where that kid had died but they did open every door and checked every room, even the ones which were unoccupied. Nothing, not a drop of blood, no weapons, no signs of a struggle. 

As the employees did work their way down through the eleven floors one of the guests were preparing for the evening. He was not there for the pageant but his daughter was studying at the local college and he had come to celebrate her birthday. The man was a car salesman, a rather jolly fellow and he had hired one of the cheap rooms with a view towards the back of the hotel. They were a part of the original building and not much had been done with them over the years, they even had their own system of heat and water since the owners hadn’t found it necessary to connect that part with the slightly newer one. 

Mr Bramble had planned for a nice evening out with his dear daughter and he was heading for the shower, it didn’t bother him that the room was a bit worn, he wasn’t going to spend all that much time there anyhow and he preferred to spend his money on his kid instead. She had just finished some important exams with top grades and it made him very proud. He stepped into the shower and turned on the taps, at first there was nothing, then the pipes started to howl and grunt and he grinned and reached for the soap, it did sound a bit like some old cars he had sold. Warm liquid started to pour over him and he closed his eyes and started to rub his skin but it felt strange, and the smell? Mr Bramble opened his eyes and then he screamed, it didn’t sound very masculine at all and he grasped for a towel and ran out of the shower in a fit of absolute panic. 

The guests were treated to a very special sight that day, the elevator next to the lobby opened and a man came running out of it, panic in his gaze and only a towel around his waist and he was dripping with blood. The towel was red, he left red footprints and before the desk he collapsed and grasped his chest, eyes bulging with pain. An ambulance was called for immediately and then some unfortunate cleaning woman was sent to Mr Bramble’s room to check if he had cut himself or whatever it was that had caused all that blood. When the woman who’s name was Dana did arrive the shower was still on and the water was just dripping but it was still pinkish and the floor was red, it did look like a scene from the movie Carrie. 

Dana did run back to the lobby yelling something about the apocalypse and the four riders of doom and bloody rain and all that stuff and the clerk did try to calm her down but she was hysterical and that was when Bard and Thran returned to the hotel, stuffed with Pete’s divine baguettes and more than a little sad they had to return to this place of insanity. The cleaner was hysterical still and Bard had to slap her to make her calm down long enough for them to understand her since she was born in Canada and started speaking French when she got upset. Bard turned to the clerk. “Where does the water for those rooms come from?” 

The man was a bit pale too and he had suffered through the first part of the day feeling as if he suddenly was part of a horror movie, without having read the manuscript first. He stuttered. “The…the roof, a cistern…”

Thran grasped hold of one of the security guards. “You, come with us. The rest of you, close the front door” 

Bard and Thran took the elevator up to the roof and the security guard was in obvious distress. “Guys, a man did shower in it, in blood. He got a heart attack right in front of the desk, came hollering, dripping with blood. That is one shitty day for sure”

Bard just sneered. “No shit Sherlock, now, where is that freaking cistern?”

The huge container was easy to spot, it wasn’t deep but rather wide and it collected rain water which was filtered and then added to the water which was sent to the showers in the cheap part of the hotel. This way they didn’t have to pump that much water up all the floors and as long as the water was clean there was no problem using it as long as it wasn’t meant for consumption. Thran slowed down, the lid was closed but they saw a padlock and it was cut in half. “Bard…” 

Bard nodded and the security guard did pull his revolver, he did look very nervous all of a sudden. “I see blood spatter” 

Thran did bite his lower lip. “Yes, and a lot of it.” 

The entire side of the cistern was covered with red, and it had dried and started to smell already and Bard took a deep breath. He pulled out a clean handkerchief from his pocket and used it to open the lid. The cistern was dark so he had to use his phone as a flashlight and what he did see made him turn his head around and groan. “Oh Gods!” 

Thran swallowed. “Alright, Ms Butterdale didn’t do it, that is pretty clear now!”

The woman who floated on her belly in the middle of the cistern was most definitely the missing one and the remaining water was rather red. Bard saw that the security guard was trembling and gestured for him to lower his gun. “Take it easy buddy, no dangers here. The dead are harmless”

The security guard tried to smile. “Guess you haven’t seen any zombie TV shows now have you?” 

Thran made a phone call and within twenty minutes the hotel was once again flooded by cops. Someone found a pole and a technician did sort of pull the body closer to the hatch. The cause of death was obvious, a nasty cut across the throat and a huge blue bruise covering the woman’s left temple. Thran swore. “She didn’t drown, that is for darn sure” 

Bard got a flashlight and used it to search the bottom of the cistern, the water was just two feet deep and he saw something down there, in spite of all the blood. “ I need the pole” 

He was handed the long thin rod and something did move down there, he sort of pushed it along the bottom and used the baton of one of the officers to lift it out of the water. It was a shoe, a stiletto. It was bright blue and very pretty but the heel was a bit bent and there was a small tear in the heel cap. He held the shoe up with a sort of grin. “I think we need to go in search for a Cinderella, not to wed but to imprison” 

Thran scoffed and they bagged the shoe, the dead body was being put onto a stretcher and before long Judith did storm onto the roof with her usual brusque expression. “So, this woman did end up in the cistern. She is tiny, but she still weighs at least a hundred and ten pounds, the one who dumped her into this cistern was strong” 

Thran nodded. “The idea of a martial arts performer fits with that fact”

Judith turned the dead woman’s head. “Then be careful, both of you. This cut was made with a very sharp weapon, and it was done very elegantly too. The dead girl was done in desperation but this…this does look premeditated.” 

Bard sighed. “Right, so, we have to trace the steps of these people, the blue fabric in Ianda’s hand, we can start with that one”

The hotel manager did meet them in the lobby, the hotel was under complete lockdown now and many were complaining, not all were polite about it. “All the people who have connections to the pageant are in the great hall, so I suggest you talk to them now, before the tempers flare too much. Some of those women…I bet a fire breathing dragon would think twice before attacking them”

Thran nodded and looked at Bard. “Come on, let us see if we can find out where Ianda went.”

The hall was full of people, most women and girls and just a handful of husbands who looked terribly uncomfortable. Thran just walked straight up to the stage and he turned around and stared at the crowd. “As you now know there has been another murder, Ms Butterdale has been brutally killed”

There was a gasp going through the hall and many did look nervous. Thran continued. “The murder of this woman and Ianda is most likely connected and we do need your help to solve some mysteries here. Ianda did take the elevator down to the second floor, carrying something in her hand, some sort of blue fabric. If anyone knows anything about this it may be of great importance…”

Silence, everybody just stared down and Thran did look a bit like a thundercloud, goddamn it, he could look very intimidating when he wanted to, even menacing. “So?” 

The voice was ice cold and everybody cringed, then a thin voice could be heard from the hall, and a girl stood up. She was not one of the participants but she was most likely a sister or something to someone who was. Bard saw that this was one awkward thing, thick glasses, a bad case of acne and she was wearing braces. “I…I know what that was…” 

Thran nodded at her. “Come with us” 

They sort of herded the girl into a small side room and she did look very scared, Bard couldn’t help but feeling sorry for her, she was wearing some clothes which did nothing to help the image they got off her and she had long greasy hair and appeared to be terribly uncertain of herself. “So, your name and then tell us the whole thing please” 

The girl swallowed. “I am Louisa Green Sir, I am the sister of Emma Green, she was among the favourites this year. Emma is very good you see”

Thran tilted his head. “It was your mother who sat next to you? And your sister?” 

Bard had seen the girl, perhaps six years of age and dressed up like a mannequin doll, she didn’t look real. “Yes, mom spends all her time with Emma” 

Bard had to mumble something nobody heard but Thran smiled, the sort of very soothing smile which made everyone relax. “She doesn’t care that much about you now does she?” 

Louisa shook her head. “No, my dad was mom’s first husband and I….I am not pretty Sir, I look…ordinary. Emma doesn’t, so she gets all the ….”

Thran finished the sentence. “Attention, too bad. So, what about the blue fabric?”

Louisa swallowed hard. “Yesterday I was trying to help rigging the stage, mom makes me help out whenever I am available. One of the girls saw that I was wearing this very old scarf made from silk, it was grandmother’s and it was very nice. She just dragged it off me and ran to her mom with it, wanted to wear it for the show. I just…I love that scarf, but the mom just took it, didn’t bother asking if they could borrow it.” 

Thran shook his head in disbelief. “That was cruel of them”

Louisa did look down, there were some tears in her eyes “Yes, and mom didn’t care when I told her, she was all like – You won’t need anything pretty anyhow for nobody wants to look at you- She does that quite often.”

Bard had to swallow. “But Ianda had it?” 

Louisa tried to smile. “Yes, she took it from that kid when they were busy rehearsing, she had seen the whole thing, And this morning she did drop into our room with it when mom was out with the brat…my sister I mean”

Thran smiled gently. “That was nice of her, she must have been quick then?”

Louisa nodded. “Yes, she just burst into the room with it and told me to hide it until we got back home, she had to get back to her room before her mom returned” 

Bard frowned “ Did she mention anything out of the ordinary?” 

Louisa sort of frowned. “No, or, she did mention that she had seen the “old hag” and that she had been furious”

The two men leaned forth. “The old hag?” 

Louisa nodded. “Yes, Cindy’s mother, she is a very unpleasant person, she will be helpful and everything but she complains all the time. She should have been named Bitterdale, not Butterdale” 

Thran did look intense. “So she is a very impolite one?” 

Louisa nodded and looked down. “Yes, but she is very fair. She doesn’t accept anything untoward if you catch my drift? She saw a judge pinch some girls butt once and she almost lost it.” 

Bard had to try to wrap his head around this for a moment. “She does love her daughter a lot yes? And she want her to win I bet?” 

Louisa nodded. “Yes, everybody knows that. But she want Cindy to look natural, like a kid you know? She hates this style many go for these days, the kids look like whores”

Thran smiled. “Know what? I think you are a very smart girl Louisa, too bad your mother doesn’t see that” 

Louisa scoffed. “ Mom? Oh she believes that if you are pretty enough you’ll get it all right away, money, a man. And that is all that matters to her. In her mind a woman doesn’t need a brain at all!”

Bard cringed. “Ouch, I thought that sort of attitude was erased in the seventies!”

Thran shook his head. “Nope, it is alive, well and kicking still, unfortunately!”

Louisa sort of made a grimace. “But I know that Ms Butterdale was in despair earlier this spring. Cindy got chickenpox before a pageant and her face had marks so she needed to use make up. She refuses to let Cindy get anywhere near anything which isn’t organic and completely natural”

Bard gaped and Thran was staring at him with narrow eyes. “Is that so? Thank you very much for your information Miss, it was very useful!”

Louisa was beaming with pride. “It was?”

Thran shook her hand. “Yes, extremely so!”

Bard waited until Louisa was out of the door. “No way in hell that woman would give her daughter hormones!”

Thran nodded. “I agree, something is very fishy here. I need to make some phone calls, I will be right back”

He disappeared outside and Bard stared at the lobby, the technicians were carrying the body of the unfortunate woman out and Bard knew what Ianda had seen. Ms Butterdale had been angry with the woman with the wig, and Ianda had seen it. And later the woman with the wig had come back for her, but the time line? It hadn’t been more than a few minutes apart?   
Judith came walking by. “Gotten anything?” 

Bard nodded. “Maybe, a clue”

Thran did return, he did grin from one ear to the other. “I have managed to get a hold of the doctor who is caring for Cindy, Ms Butterdale had the number in her pageant papers. It has to do with insurance, they need to know that the kids do have a physician in case something happens.” 

Bard was on edge. “And?” 

Thran looked like a cat who has swallowed a fat rat. “Cindy had developed some odd symptoms over the last months, put on weight, got bad skin, her chest had grown…”

Bard swallowed and looked stunned. “Hormones?” 

Thran nodded. “Yes, but in very small doses, he had no idea of where it could have come from. Ms Butterdale was very careful with anything artificial” 

Bard stared at Thran, he got a terrible suspicion, his mind reeling. “Do you have google on your phone?” 

Thran frowned. “Yes?” 

The dark haired one nodded. “Open it, google Camille Buxley and martial arts” 

Thran did look puzzled but obeyed, the phone let out a small sound. “Nothing?” 

Bard tried to think. “Alright, she is miss, maybe she has been married before? Try just Camille and martial arts?” 

Thran did type and the phone was silent for a while, then there was a loud buzz and Thran gaped. “Oh my…look at this!”

He held the phone so Bard could see it and lo and behold, there they saw a picture of a slightly younger and thinner Ms Buxley, holding a sort of gilded vase, grinning from one ear to the other. She was wearing a white kimono with two black belts and there were others around her wearing the same attire. Bard had to read. “A new victory for five times state Tae kwon do champion Camille Mondes” 

Thran did look as if he had been looking for the light, not seeing that it was burning right under his nose. “See? There is another article here”

Bard did read the headline. “State champion out of the finals, injured again”

Thran nodded. “And look at this one” 

Bard frowned. “Former state champion found guilty, accusations of drug use told the truth” 

He read through it swiftly. “She used steroids?!”

Thran sighed. “Guess who our Cinderella is?” 

Bard almost growled. “I think I know what this is about now, the skin cream and the make up, I bet it contains hormones” 

Thran had gotten a very hard expression on his eyes. “Yes, and that is illegal. It would have made any mother pissed off”

Bard checked his gun and nodded to Thran. “Do google the “charming and flawless” make up brand, I bet the owner and distributor is none other than the charming Ms Buxley”

Thran obeyed and smiled, a wide and vicious grin. “Bingo Bard, you were right. The name Buxley came from her ex husband”

Bard waved his hands at two of the officers by the door. “You two, come here, we need some help. We have a suspect but she may try to run, and she is an ex martial artist and can be very dangerous”

The two men did look a bit stunned and Thran took a deep breath and opened the door to the hall. He did look at the crowd and frowned. “Have any of you seen Ms Buxley?”

Everybody shrugged. “She was here just minutes ago?”

Thran swore. “Is there some other doors here?”

One of the moms nodded. “Yes? Over there behind the scene, it goes into the elevators they use to transport furniture and stuff?”

Thran swore. “Right, she is on the lose”

He turned to Bard. “We have to stop her”

They ran out of the hall and stopped by the desk, the poor clerk was already convinced that this was a taste of what purgatory would be like. “Quick, the goods elevator behind the large hall, where does it lead to? Can you get out of the hotel from it?”

The clerk gaped like a fish on dry land. “Uh, yes, of course. We use it to transport heavy objects? It ends in the basement, there is a loading area down there” 

Thran was impatient. “Does it lead outside?” 

The clerk nodded. “Yes, you can drive a whole truck into it but there is a gate and it is always closed. You will need an universal card to open it”

Bard almost moaned. “And I bet she has got one!”

Thran yelled at the officers. “Follow us, quick!”

They ran outside and sprinted off to the parking lot where the guests parked their cars and a red sedan was shooting out of the parking lot just as they entered it. The car did burst through the toll gate and onto the road and Bard and Thran ran to their cruiser which was parked at the front of the hotel. Bard threw himself into the car and started it and Thran grasped the radio. “Attention all units, a red sedan just left the Golden crane hotel, it is driving southwards on the Sour apple lane, the suspect may be armed and dangerous but must be stopped” 

Bard swore and turned on the lights and sirens and the powerful cruiser was purring, this engine was built for car chases and they shot out of the parking lot. The red sedan was not a very powerful car but it was light and it was rather apparent that Ms Buxley could drive. She was swerving between the cars and she was heading for the highway. Bard was afraid that she would reach it, the traffic was dense at this time of the day and they didn’t want an accident. Suddenly two more cruisers appeared out of a sideway and the red sedan did a swift turn and headed down another road. “Where does this lead?”

Thran opened the GPS which was built into the cruiser. “It ends at the old factory district, shit, thousands of places to hide!”

Bard roared into the radio. “All units, the suspect is heading towards the abandoned factory yards by the river, she must be stopped at all costs”

The cruiser was getting closer to the sedan, Bard was preparing to do a pit manoeuvre, he doubted that the woman would be skilled enough to control the car if he did execute that perfectly. As he got closer to the rear of the sedan the woman did speed up again, the speed was insane now and Thran was frowning. “That sedan is not going to take this much punishment much longer, the engine isn’t made for such abuse” 

Bard nodded. “Yes, it is old, and if I don’t remember it wrong that particular type of car use a heck of a lot of oil when they pass ten thousand miles.” 

He tried to get close again and now the road was getting more narrow and there were high fences on both sides of it. Then there was an opening up ahead and Bard cussed. “Oh shit, oh no you don’t”

But the driver of the red car did see the opening and the red sedan did rush towards it, tore through the fence and then it went flying. Bard stopped the cruiser and they both ran out of it, staring at the whole in the wall. The red sedan had landed in what could only be described as a pool but it didn’t contain water. This was four feet with old oil and grease and someone was desperately trying to crawl out of the pit. Bard and Thran did run down the main entrance to the yard and several cruisers had arrived and at least five officers were joining them. The creature emerging from the pit did look like something out of the black lagoon, oil and grease was dripping off her and she held something in her hand which did look like a drowned cat or something but Bard did see that it was a dark wig. 

Bard did try to grasp onto her but she spun and he got a punch to his chest so hard he staggered back. Then she went for Thran and tried to kick him in the groin but now Bard saw something rather amazing. Thran sort of floated out of the way, caught the leg and flipped her around, tossed her to the ground and then he kneeled and caught her arms and one leg in an iron grip. Two of the others expertly cuffed her and Bard stared at Thran. “What the… I had no idea you could fight?”

Thran just brushed the dust off his clothes. “I have been taught Krav Maga by my body guards”

The woman on the ground was so angry she was steaming and Bard hauled her onto her feet and sneered at her. “You killed an innocent woman and you slaughtered a kid who only tried to help someone who had it hard “

Ms Buxley was shrieking, her charming appearance gone like mist for the sun and she had lost her glasses, it was rather apparent that she did see rather well even without them. “That old whore! She was onto me, she didn’t want the kids to be “polluted” And Ianda that little smartass, she saw me!”

Thran did look menacing again. “Let me guess, you added hormones to that skin cream, and Ms Butterdale did find out about it when Cindy developed boobs too early”

The woman tried to spit but covered with old oil she didn’t look very scary at all, the wet clothes did reveal that she had muscles still, and that she was rather buff, she just looked overweight. “Yes, it was such a good idea, it would give the kids problem skin and then my make up would cover it up and I would be there to provide them with all that they needed” 

Bard sighed. “Greed, it was all greed from the very start now wasn’t it?”

They hauled her off to the squad car and the owner stared at them with disbelief. “That greased up hoe is not going into my cruiser, no way!” 

Bard waved his hands at one of the officers at the scene. “Go grasp that tarp over there, wrap her in it, we need to get her to the station” 

Ms Buxley was screaming about police brutality when they wrapped her up and pushed her into the car, Bard and Thran stared at each other. “So, what is next”

Bard clenched his teeth together. “We have to find the exact way this happened. There is no way she had time to murder Ms Butterdale and then get to the elevator in time to catch Ianda.” 

Thran nodded. “You are right, there is something odd there”

They drove to the station and whence they were there they heard how Ms Buxley were screaming as two female officers did scrub her down in the showers. Thor was glaring, he didn’t like this case at all and when Judith and the rest of the technicians did return Bard and Thran were ready to interrogate Ms Buxley again. She was dripping wet and wearing a bath robe and some old pants someone was generous enough to offer her. She was glaring at the two and Thran sat down and he was smiling “So, you were seen arguing with Ms Butterdale by Ianda, and you did intercept her in the elevator, but in between that you must have handled Ms Butterdale somehow”

Ms Buxley did glare at them. “I am not speaking without a lawyer” 

Bard did smile . “Fair enough, I am sure I can find someone willing to represent someone who has been mixing hormones in skin cream aimed at kids, who has killed a little girl and a loving mother. I cannot promise that it will be a good lawyer but in your situation that doesn’t matter, no jury will let you go. You are in for life, probably more” 

Ms Buxley glared again, her eyes were shooting lightening and Thran tilted his head. “I am a psychologist Ms Buxley, I work for the feds as a profiler. And I know people and how they work, how the mind is put together. I can help the lawyer create a defence and believe me, you want me on your side in this. So spill it, unless you want me to ensure that you will spend the next sixty years in solitary confinement strapped into a nice white west with long sleeves, drooling and pissing yourself every second hour!.”

Ms Buxley swallowed, she looked down. “Listen, I couldn’t let that kid get away ha? I knocked that old hag out and hid her in a broom closet and then I found that little brat and tried to bribe her into keeping her mouth shut. But she refused and I snapped, I kicked her! I know I shouldn’t have but she had it coming, nosy little runt!” 

Thran frowned. “Where did this happen?”

Ms Buxley sighed. “A storage room, for bedding, on the seventh floor. I covered the blood with sheets, figured that since everybody would be leaving soon there wouldn’t be need for new sheets for a few days and then I would be long gone” 

Bard took a deep breath. “And you got her down to the basement how?” 

Ms Buxley shrugged. “I used the goods elevator, and I knew that a dead kid makes people lose it so I put her behind the boiler to be found by someone, thought that nobody would look for the old hag when there is a kid missing. I had enough time to get rid of Ms Butterdale afterwards, used the elevator again. I hauled the old sough up onto the roof, slit her throat with a shaving knife and shoved her into the cistern and that was that”

Thran sighed and grasped his phone, he spoke for a few minutes and then they heard a voice confirming that they had found blood in the room Ms Buxley mentioned. And the technicians had found a shaving knife in the filter of the cistern. Bard tilted his head. “You threw away the shoe you used to murder Ianda, where is the other one?” 

Ms Buxley snorted. “In the garbage, I threw that one into the garbage chute used by the staff. Goddamn it, those shoes were expensive, and sexy. I hated having to toss them away”

Bard managed to smile, and that smile made Thran hiss, he had never seen Bard looking that nasty before. “Well Ms Buxley, from now on it will be only orange for you when it comes to fashion and loafers instead of high heels.“

The woman glared at him again and Thran sighed. “You will be transferred to a high security jail as soon as the trial is done, I don’t think there can be any doubt about the sentence” 

Ms Buxley growled. “She could have kept her mouth shut, goddamn nag! It wasn’t as if I was doing any harm now was it? The little bastard of hers would grow boobs soon even without that little help.”

Thran got up, he didn’t even look at her. “Know what? I agree with Ms Butterdale, I totally agree, we can do without all that artificial stuff. And I bet the jury will agree too, none like the idea of having their kids stuffed full of all sorts of chemicals without them even being aware of it. I bet the lawsuits will be hefty, and nasty too”

Bard grinned. “Charming and flawless, now that is at least one thing nobody can claim that you are, not anymore”

As they left the room they both heard Ms Buxley release a swarm of cuss words so bad Thran cringed but the case was solved and Thor gave them both a thumbs up. “When it comes to it I am almost glad it was this simple and not some pervert, but what a nasty woman”

Thran sent the boss a wry grin. “There is a harpy in every woman, and in that one it had taken over. Too many punches to the head for sure” 

 

The whole case did come to its end rather fast, since Ms Buxley had confessed the trial was organized fast and within a month she was sentenced to two hundred and forty years in jail with no chance of probation and Bard was pretty sure that she would become less than popular among the other women of that jail when they found out what she had done. The lawyer who got her case was trying her best but not even a top notch lawyer could have managed to get Ms Buxley anything less than life for the jury didn’t even need five minutes to come to a conclusion, all agreed that she was guilty.   
When Thran and Bard did get home late that evening they told Sigrid and Tilda about the case and made both girls swear not to wear makeup until they were good and ready for it and Judith did test one of the jars of skin cream and found that it contained so much hormones and chemicals it could have been sold as hormone enhancements for women who were struggling with the onset of menopause. No wonder it did give Cindy bad skin since she was used to a very pure environment. The girl was adopted by a sister of Ms Butterdale who had been living abroad for years and that ended very well. Mrs Smith did mourn her daughter for several months and then she started working on a project which was aiming to increase the knowledge about the effects of artificial hormones in kids and the hotel went bankrupt the next year and was bought by a property developer who transformed it into a casino, so there would be no more beauty pageants held there and perhaps that was for the greater good.


	3. Sweet child of mine...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thran drags Bard to a rather posh party and they meet new friends and has to deal with a crisis which demands their talents, not as much as cops but as dads.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is a little birthday present to Rogercat/Nelyasun. Thank you for the idea, and happy birthday a little in advance :)

Chapter three: Sweet child of mine…

 

“I look like a freaking penguin!”

Bard snorted and stared at the mirror, his reflection was not what he was used to for he was wearing a tuxedo and it was the first time he had worn such an outfit in quite a while. Thran did grin at him from across the room. “You look spectacular dear, not silly at all”

Bard sighed and tried to smile, his face felt stiff and he would have preferred to avoid this but since he was married to a person with both wealth and influence there was no way around it. Social events like this were unavoidable. Thran did straighten his jacket a bit and checked his whole appearance, even the shoes had to be perfect. “Do I really have to do this?”

Bard’s voice was thin and Thran chuckled. “Yes, Thingol is an old friend of mine and he will be very disappointed if you don’t come. He has been very eager to meet you” 

Bard sighed. “Curious you mean? I am sure I am way below him status wise” 

Thran tilted his head. “You are an important person Bard, that is what matters to him. You do a job which protects everybody, Thingol included. He wants to remain on friendly terms with the members of the police force.” 

Bard growled, he felt as if he was being choked by the shirt and he felt uncomfortable. He rolled his eyes. “But I have no clue about what I am to do over there? Just stand there looking like a wall decoration?”

Thran laughed. “No, chat, mingle, have fun” 

Bard scoffed. “This will be just as much fun as having the hairs on my balls plucked out with pliers, one by one!”

Thran had to laugh again. “Maybe, but the booze is free, remember that. Just don’t get overly drunk” 

Bard frowned. “And by overly drunk you mean?”

Thran shrugged. “Hanging from the chandelier impersonating a gorilla sort of drunk. One of the teachers from the academy did that two years ago, the servants had to discretely remove him from the fruit buffet.” 

Bard had to laugh and Thran grasped his hand and kissed it lovingly. “Don’t worry love, it will be very nice, just pretend to be very posh and well behaved. Nobody will remember you tomorrow anyhow so just go with the flow”

Bard remembered something and had to giggle, Thran raised an eyebrow. “What are you thinking about?” 

Bard blinked away some tears of mirth. “Oh I remember the party when Thor was made chief of this precinct, one of the guys got bored and started using a new name each time he did greet someone new. At the end he used completely silly names, one of the bosses spent the evening believing the man was named Jacob Kreutzfeld” 

Thran chuckled. “Oh, the scientific name of mad cow disease, just in the opposite order? I have heard such pranks. One of my fellow students did present himself as Mike Rotch to the professor, it did cause some laughter. But don’t do that please, I will present you as my gorgeous handsome and smart husband” 

Bard had to smile. “Alright, I will do my best not to climb the bannister pretending to be Tarzan” 

Thran laughed out loud. “I don’t mind you doing that, but only if we are alone.” 

They walked downstairs and Jean stood there making dinner for the kids, she gaped, “Now that is two fine gentlemen if I ever laid eyes upon such, have a good evening boys, and remember, don’t be home before twelve” 

Bard smiled. “Of course not, remember to give Tilda her coughing medicine before she goes to bed, and don’t let her watch that dreadful cartoon she loves so much, she learns some rather untoward language from it” 

Jean giggled. “Oh don’t worry. I will be stern and fair, as always” 

Thran had bought a new car a while ago, a very nice one which did turn some heads and now Dwalin was acting as their driver, he was grinning from one ear to the other as the powerful engine hummed and growled. He had never believed that he would be allowed to drive this beauty. Thingol did live some miles away from the city itself, he was said to own half the city in one way or the other and Bard didn’t doubt it. He was a multi billionaire and he was also very camera shy so few had ever seen him. Bard wondered how Thran had come to know him and Thran explained that he had been part of a project Thingol had started and Thran had managed to discover a fraud which could possibly have ruined the whole thing. Thingol had thought the world of him ever since. Thingol Grey did have a very nice home, or home? Bard could only compare it with a palace and it was huge, and extremely elegant. Thingol had wealth, but he did also have taste and nothing there was gaudy or over the top.   
They drove up in front of the house and Thran squeezed Bard’s hand. “Remember, smile, act pleasantly and I promise, I will reward you when we get back home” 

Bard nodded, that did sound very promising. 

A valet did open the car door and Thran did slide out of the car with an elegance Bard envied him deeply, he felt like some freakish animal as he sort of pushed himself out of the door. Thran entered the stairs with the mine of an emperor returning home from a victory and Bard tried to hold his head up and look as if he belonged there. Thingol came to greet them and Bard blinked and felt impressed. The man was very tall, even taller than Thran and he was dressed in a very simple and yet elegant grey suit which matched his hair perfectly. He could be anything from forty to sixty years of age for his face didn’t reveal his age at all but Bard knew he had an adult daughter so he had to be closer to sixty. There were people everywhere, wearing clothes Bard expected cost more than his entire salary that year and some of the women there were devouring him and Thran with their eyes, some men too when he looked closely. 

Thingol did hug Thran and smiled widely, he did look genuinely happy to see him. Then he shook Bard’s hand and Bard was surprised to feel the strength in that grip, the man didn’t just look fit, he was very fit indeed. “So this is the man who managed to catch your heart Thran? I must say you have done a remarkable catch this time” 

Thran just laughed. “I do believe so yes” 

Thingol tilted his heads. “From the ranks of our city’s finest, I envy you Thran, but alas, I am old and no longer capable of competing for the attention of such gorgeous specimen.” 

He did pet Bard on his shoulder. “Well done young man, Thran is among the best people I have ever met and that says a lot. Enjoy the party and welcome to Doriath” 

Bard nodded and found that he liked Thingol, the man seemed to be a very real person in spite of being wealthier than the bank. Thran did drag Bard off towards a buffet table where a valet gave them a glass of champagne each. Bard wasn’t used to it, and he grimaced. “Is he…?” 

Thran shook his head. “No, bi. He is married to a woman, Melian Grey. She is a world renowned botanist, currently somewhere in south America looking for some Orchid which the locals claim can cure anything from foot fungus to cancer. Thingol once confessed that he hoped that it could cure Melian’s fondness of hearing her own voice to but that would be too great a miracle to hope for” 

Bard had to laugh, the crowd was milling around, chatting and mingling and he felt a bit more at ease. “He does have a daughter?’

Thran nodded. “Yes, Luthien, she is promising opera singer, and she is also a physicist, believe it or not. She got married last summer, and had a baby six months ago.” 

Bard raised an eyebrow. “Really? I haven’t heard anything about that?” 

Thran sipped at his champagne. “This family is very private, they prefer to stay clear of the reporters and the internet. Thingol knows who to pay to make sure that it remains that way. Luthien and her husband are probably here too.” 

Bard sighed. “So, her husband, who is he? Some hot shot millionaire?” 

Thran chuckled. “Heavens no, she married a man named Beren Green, he is a park ranger, worked in the national park up north when they met and of course Thingol wasn’t too thrilled about that at all. He has tried to match Luthien up to someone else, someone way more suitable the way he sees it but I bet she is capable of detecting quality way better than her father.” 

Bard frowned. “How come?” 

Thran pointed discretely at the musicians who were playing from a raised stage at the end of the hall. “See that violinist? He is the one Thingol tried to match her up with. Daeron Von Schatten, a prodigy and one of the world’s best musicians. He is loaded too, from a family so wealthy I bet they never have had to do anything themselves. Too bad the lad is stupid as a piece of coal” 

Bard scoffed. “What?” 

Thran nodded. “It is true, I have talked to him on some occasions, he may be extremely talented with instruments but he has no clue about how he is to interact with other people. He treats them as things. I think he may have a diagnosis but of course the family is too “fine” to have something as mundane as disease”

Bard lowered his voice. “He does sound like an autist then, maybe a savant?” 

Thran nodded. “Most definitely, but he can be nasty. I think he is royally spoiled and believes that the world revolves around his person” 

Bard did notice that the tall dark man did play very well, the music was wonderful but he had already decided that he didn’t like the musician at all. Thran suddenly tensed up, and his grip on his champagne glass tightened. Bard saw that a woman was heading their way and she was well above her youth but seemed to have forgotten about that for the dress she wore was the type which exposes more skin than what ordinarily ought to be legal. Too bad that all that skin was of the sagging kind and Bard got a terrible mental image, he had once seen a Shar Pei puppy with that sort of wrinkles. The woman wore a diamond necklace and it was so gaudy Bard wondered what jeweller it was who had forsaken all professional pride to make that monstrosity. It hurt looking at it. The woman spread her arms and ran straight at Thran who managed to put on a very forced grin. “Thranduil Oropherson, daaaarling! How nice to seeee you again!”

Judging by her speech she had either had one too many glasses of champagne already or she had suffered a stroke! Thran bared his teeth. “Lavinia, what a…wonderful coincidence!”

The woman tilted her head and stared at Bard the way a hungry pit bull stares at a huge piece of raw steak. “Ah daaarling, this must be your husband, oh sweeeetness, how perfectly handsome!”

Bard remembered his manners, he did bow politely and took the woman’s hand, kissed swiftly. She wore more rings than a rap star! “Such a gentleman, you know how to get the good ones now don’t you daaarling” 

Thran took a deep breath. “Bard, this is Lavinia Ross, she was a friend of my father” 

Lavinia giggled, it would have sounded way better coming from a seven year old girl. “Ah yes, a good friend.” 

Bard swallowed hard, the woman had taken a bath in perfume and it wasn’t the discrete type, it made him dizzy. Thran started to look a bit desperate for Lavinia was trying to take his arm and her somewhat swimming expression told Bard that yes, she was drunk as a skunk. Then a lovely modulated voice did float in from the left and a tall and otherworldly beautiful woman did appear followed by a very handsome dark haired man. “Oh Lavinia, leave the guests alone will you? I just saw that Russian diplomat you like so much over by the pool, I am sure he is just dying to exchange some juicy gossip with you” 

Lavinia let out a small gasp and it did sound very thrilled and then she shot off again, heading towards the exit. Thran let out a sigh of relief. “Thank you Luthien, that was close”

Luthien smiled. “Lavinia is unfortunately someone who has to be invited, not doing that would be a terrible insult. But father hates her guts and he makes sure that there are several bottles of her favourite wine ready in her room when she arrives.” 

Bard tried to smile but found that he couldn’t, that Lavinia woman sounded like a really bothersome person. Luthien did take his hand, “So this is Thran’s husband, I am very pleased to meet you Mr Bowman, I have heard so much about you” 

Bard blushed and Thran laughed. “And believe me, none of it negative.” 

Beren smiled gently and Bard immediately liked the man, he seemed to be a decent person, used to hard work. Bard did bow his head and Thran sighed. “Lavinia is a countess, from England. The family is older than the hills and she owns a line of jewellery stores, she is richer than me for sure” 

Luthien giggled. “And knows how to show it too, but that necklace she was wearing now, what a monster. I bet Mr Doriwich choked on his beard when she gave him that design” 

Thran nodded. “Yes, he puts his pride in his work, but everything for the boss right?” 

Bard stared at Thran. “So, she knew your father?” 

Thran hissed and seemed to shudder for a moment. “Yes, help me God! She was part of his social circle and she tried to hook me up with her daughter” 

Bard stared with huge eyes. “She did?”

Thran nodded and his face told of intense disgust. “Yes, not only is lady Selena at least fifteen years older than me but she resembles a horse and sounds like one too. Even if I wasn’t gay I would run as far away from that creature as I can, she is a man eater” 

Luthien giggled. “Yes, but she has learned a lesson recently” 

Thran flipped his head around. “Oh? How? I believed that she was unable to learn anything at all, she is as stupid as a certain musician” 

Luthien smiled wryly. “Oh but she did make a move on the wrong person, some very famous sports star, I think he is an MMA fighter or something like that. Very handsome but way too vigorous for someone her age.” 

Bard blinked. “Oh?” 

Thran did look very curious. “Don’t tell me she got more than she asked for?” 

Beren did lift an eyebrow and there was a diabolical glimpse in his eyes. “She did, not only did he manage to dislocate her hip during their night of “passion” but she also had to spend some time at a very expensive clinic, a private one. Apparently he had some funny bugs and she had to use antibiotics for some months. What goes around comes around” 

Luthien did take Beren’s arm. “She tried to have a go at him when I introduced him to the family, Beren doesn’t like Selena very much” 

Thran laughed. “That explains a lot, like mother like daughter. So, how is Dior doing?” 

Luthien smiled, the warm smile of a loving mother. “Oh he is doing so well, he is growing with each day and he is such a bundle of joy. The only problem is that he has gotten a stomach bug and is on medication but it will be gone in a few days. At least that is what the doctor says” 

Bard smiled, “That happens yes, my kids all have a nasty cold now, there is coughing in every room. I just hope none of us adults catch it” 

Luthien smiled even wider. “Children are such a joy now aren’t they? But of course a lifetime of worries does come with each one. “ 

Bard had to laugh. “Indeed. I bet your father is spoiling the little guy?” 

Luthien nodded. “Oh yes, royally. He has already given Dior a car, he won’t be able to drive it for yet some years but it is ready, a miniature Audi A8, expensive as…well, you know my dad!” 

Thran tilted his head. “I have heard some rumours regarding your former…ah…admirer, he didn’t take it very well when you hooked up with Beren here?” 

Luthien scoffed. “No shit, pardon my French but Daeron is the biggest piece of crap I have meet. His family name may be grand and everything but I think his ancestors did marry their cousins a few times too many. He can play like a God but when it comes to everything else he is a jerk, and a mean one too” 

Bard did frown. “If the family is connected to the old European royal families there could be some inbreeding on the family tree indeed. “

Luthien grinned. “Oh yes, I once saw his family tree and I think he is among the very few people who can claim to be his own grandfather or something like that, it was more complex than the calculations I do everyday and some of the names did appear at least five times in different positions.” 

Beren chuckled. “Yes, but Daeron isn’t as bad as some of his distant relatives. If I don’t recall it wrong one of the family lines ended with a guy who was so inbred he didn’t learn how to walk until he was eight!”

Luthien sighed “I have to go, there are so many people I have to meet, dad expect me to be the perfect hostess when mother is away.” 

Thran nodded his head. “It was grand meeting you Luthien” 

Beren shook Thran’s hand. “A small warning, the guy over there in the purple suit? He is like a tick, you can’t shake him off, make sure that neither of you end up alone with him, he has submarine hands” 

Bard frowned. “Submarine hands?!” 

Beren nodded and grinned. “Yes, you’ll never know where they will emerge, or when!”

Thran did take a deep breath. “So, let us face the enemy, smile and think about something pleasant” 

Bard managed to smile. “Yes, I am ready to charge!”

Thran petted his back. “That is excellent love, never let it be said that we did shy away from battle!”

 

A few hours later Bard was buzzed and he felt as if his head was floating along the roof somewhere. He had a silly grin plastered to his face and managed to nod and smile and answer when asked questions. He was following Thran as if they were Siamese twins and Thran was as usual being spectacular. He really knew how to navigate the social arena and he spread compliments, tasteful jokes and friendly banter left and right. Most seemed to be completely taken by him. Bard ended up talking with a very decent chap, a man who worked for Thingol as head of security and he had the evening off and was enjoying the music. Bard did notice that the musicians had several instruments each and Daeron had what equalled to an entire truckload of huge bags and caskets. The guy had to be able to play just about anything. Bard did in fact enjoy himself for here he had found someone he could talk business with and they stood there discussing the newest developments within the field of non lethal weapons when Thran sauntered over to them. “Bard, it is time to get back home, the party is about to go airborne now and I don’t think you will be as comfortable as you have been until now.” 

Bard raised his gaze and saw that the elegance had been replaced by behaviour he often had seen while on duty, the sort of behaviour which appears when you add huge amounts of liquor to a crowd not used to it. Two women were fighting on top of a table and a man wearing only pants and a torn shirt was standing in one of the fountains, throwing some sort of floating decorations at everyone within range. Bard had to gape. “Yes, you are right, I think we’d better get back home!”

Thran took him by the hand and they went to find Thingol. He was talking to a very elegant blonde woman who appeared to be stone sober. She was obviously very fit and she wore a very elaborate dress made from green velvet. It was both elegant and classy and probably very expensive. Thingol smiled when he saw Thran. “Ah, there you are. I have a small thing for you” 

He opened a closet hanging on the wall and took out a bottle. Thran just stared. “Sir, that is…” 

Thingol chuckled. “A very nice whiskey yes, I must admit that I have a soft spot for it, even though it is a bit tough on this old gut” 

Bard did see that it was a whiskey which cost almost as much as a good car, Thingol had to really like Thran. Thran thanked profusely and Thingol hugged him and Bard got a firm handshake too. Bard turned to Thran as they returned to the car. “What was that all about, that whiskey?!” 

Thran sighed. “Oh yes. The project I saved for Thingol, if it had gone down the drain he would have lost everything he has, but I did discover that one of the contractors had some rather dirty secrets and that he was using the money Thingol gave him to pay off debt, and the buildings were being built very cheaply. It would have been a terrible scandal if it had been allowed to continue” 

Bard nodded. “Then I understand the gratitude. I wonder if Jean is up still”

Thran looked at his watch. “No, it is a quarter past four in the morning” 

Bard had to gasp. “That late, ah, early? Where did the evening go?” 

Thran chuckled. “Yes indeed” 

They found some food when they returned to their home and then they silently got upstairs to their bedroom. Thran did keep his word, he did reward Bard in a very pleasant manner and when they fell asleep both were sated and very relaxed. It had been a very nice evening and the only negative thing Bard could think of had been some small cookies which had been so spicy the taste stayed in your mouth for hours afterwards. 

 

Thran and Bard woke up to the sound of Thran’s cell phone ringing rather loudly, and it didn’t stop. Thran did rub his eyes and stared at the clock on the wall. “Seven thirty? What the fuck?!” 

Bard did groan, the champagne had left him with a head filled with lead and a tongue which felt as if it was covered with felt. “We are both off duty today?” 

Thran did grasp the phone and frowned. “That is Luthien’s number?” 

He answered and they heard a shaking voice, it was Luthien and she appeared to be close to tears. “Thranduil, oh God, I need your help! Someone has taken Dior!”

Thran sat up in the bed so fast he almost head butted Bard who was struggling against his duvet. “What?!”

Luthien was sobbing. “We were going to check in on him now five minutes ago but the crib was empty and there was a note…!”

She appeared to be hysterical and they heard a deeper voice in the background, probably Beren. He too sounded shaken. “The note said that the police had to be kept out of this, or else the kidnapper would hurt the baby…”

Bard swallowed hard. “Goddamn it!”

Thran tried to think. “Is there any demand for ransom money?” 

Beren sounded as if he was about to pass out. “No, just a warning. Oh God, he needs his medicine, the stomach bug…” 

Thran took a deep breath. “Calm down, breathe, gather house security, check the surveillance videos, seal off the entire property. We are coming!”

He shut off the phone and jumped out of the bed and Bard did the same on his side, he felt frantic. If someone had planned on kidnapping the child the party had been the perfect opportunity. There had been people everywhere! Bard was staring at Thran. “Shit, it must have happened not long after we left then?” 

Thran nodded and got his clothes on, not the suit now, but dark jeans, t shirt and a thin jacket. Bard did the same, he jumped down the stairs on one leg and got his boots on while leaving the front door. Thran was already running for the garage, he jumped into the most anonymous car they had, a sedan which looked like the type of car a soccer mom would own but in truth it was a well camouflaged beast. The engine was changed and so were all systems. It looked like an ordinary old nag but was in fact a thoroughbred. 

Thran did drive, he didn’t break the speed limit but he knew how to drive very efficiently and it didn’t take them long before they drove through the front gate. Luthien came running down the stairs to meet them, she was red eyed and she hadn’t done anything with her hair, it was loose and hang like a thick black curtain down her back. She threw herself at Thran immediately and Bard saw that the security guards were busy, they appeared to check every bush and nook and cranny of the property. Bard tried to think. “Is the kid’s bedroom close to yours?” 

Beren had also appeared and he tried to calm down Luthien. “Yes, it is connected to ours, there is a door between them, and the nanny has a room on the opposite side of it. You have to get through either that or ours to get to his room!” 

Bard nodded. “Have you seen anything one the videos?” 

Beren shook his head. “No, the cameras have been shut off, and some have been sprayed with something, even the hidden ones. The one who did this knew the house.” 

They entered the mansion and Luthien did lead them towards the second floor where their private rooms were located. Thran did stare at the hallway, and Bard saw what he saw. The one who took Dior had to have been very swift and very determined for there had been guards at the top of the stairs. 

The bedroom was small and cosy, the crib was a very nice one, a bit old fashioned but well made and Luthien sobbed. “The kidnapper has just lifted the boy out of the crib, blankets and everything” 

Thran stared at the crib, the scene could tell a profiler a lot and Bard did trust Thran to see what he himself could not. He didn’t have the gift of entering someone’s mind and knew that Thran was almost able to read someone’s mind, just by observing their actions. Thran did walk around the crib, stared at the entire room. He touched nothing but took interest in the windows, they were closed and there were alarms on them. “The house alarms, do you change the code often?” 

Luthien nodded. “Yes, every second day as a matter of fact” 

Thran mumbled and stared at the crib again, Bard could see that he was thinking very hard. “So, the culprit takes the kid, with his blankets and everything but leaves his stuffed toy? The kidnapper is not used to children, the crime is premeditated but not very well thought through. It is not a sudden decision but I feel that it is still a crime of passion, otherwise ransom would be the first thing on the culprit’s mind” 

Luthien gasped. “Oh God, there are…there are a lot of people who doesn’t like my father, he is rather ruthless when he does his business but he has to be, he would go bankrupt if he wasn’t!” 

They left the bedrooms, Thran stopped in the hallway. “The thing which puzzles me is how the culprit got the kid out of here, unseen. There were people in every room, the gates were guarded and you can’t just grab a kid and get away with it. “ 

Bard was trying to think of a way out when they did notice something odd, the hallway was rather dark but they saw a small shadow moving along the floor and Thran frowned. “Ah, do you own a cat?” 

Luthien shook her head. “A cat? No? I would love to but dad is allergic, he loves cats but can’t go anywhere near them.” 

Bard saw that the shadow did stop in front of a small door, and for a moment there was no doubt about it, it was a black cat, with a golden collar and a gold earring. Luthien did look shocked and Beren frowned. “Where did that one come from?” 

The cat seemed to disappear into the darkness and Bard and Thran did run forth, they stared at the door. Luthien did look puzzled. “That is a broom closet?” 

Bard opened the door, his other hand on his gun and Thran was ready too, the closet was empty. But among the brooms and other washing equipment was something which didn’t belong there at all, a very nice cello. Beren cussed and Luthien did suddenly look absolutely frightening. “Oh God, I am gonna…” 

Thran touched the cello. “It is perfect really, the crate this ought to be in is the right size” 

Bard took a deep breath. “Daeron. He must be the biggest moron there ever was, leaving the cello like that.” 

Luthien almost growled. “He has had it in for me ever since I told him to get lost, but I never anticipated something like this. What is it that he hopes to achieve?!”

Thran did close the door. “To cause fear, and to feel powerful, in charge of the situation. He want’s to humiliate you for having rejected him. I don’t like this at all” 

Beren did look pale. “Can he harm Dior?” 

Thran shrugged. “Hopefully not on purpose but understand this, to Daeron people are like tools, something to use. If the kid proves to be bothersome he may just leave him” 

Luthien got ashen pale and looked as if she was about to pass out and Beren had to hold her tight. “Dear. Breathe. It is alright, they will find him” 

Thran turned to Bard. “We need to find the car Daeron used, and then we have to pinpoint his exact position, we don’t have much time” 

Bard made a grimace. “No Amber alert?” 

Thran shook his head. “No, that will alert the son of a bitch that we are on his tail, I want to catch him quickly.” 

Bard ran over to the head of security, the man did look very distraught but he did have a good head on his shoulders and could provide them with the information they needed. “Daeron did drive an SUV, a huge Toyota. It is pale blue with glitter finish and the number plates says “Muse12” Shall I check the network” 

Thran nodded. “Yes, make the call, but discretely. Ask Elisa, she may be able to locate the car. Does Daeron have a cell phone?” 

Luthien nodded and gave them the number and Bard went to work. He did get a hold of Elisa and Beren found a laptop Bard did log into. The major roads had cameras and she had a program which allowed her to search for cars of a specific type. It took ten minutes, then Elisa showed them an image of a car which had to be Daeron’s and it was heading north, out of the city. Thran frowned. “Where is he heading?” 

Beren swallowed visibly. “Shit, the national park! He is heading for the national park!”

Bard looked at Beren. “What makes you think so?” 

Beren groaned. “He knows I used to be a park ranger, and he is furious with me. I bet he wants to just drop the kid in there somewhere, he knows that none of us will be able to find Dior in there, it is a vast area” 

Thran did take a very deep breath. “Right, do you have contact with the park authorities still?!” 

Beren nodded and Thran became efficient. “Good, call them and tell them to close off all the main entrances, but don’t let them approach Daeron if they see him. He may use the kid as a shield.” 

Thran did find his own cell phone and searched through the contacts. “I know someone who can help, I bet you know him too Luthien?” 

She gaped, tilted her head. “You know him?!” 

Thran nodded. “Yes, I helped him overcome some…issues…when he returned from the war. Is it alright with you? If Daeron leaves Dior somewhere in the park he is the best there is, he can find anyone, anywhere” 

Luthien did stare at him, her eyes were large still. “Do it, call the hunter” 

Bard frowned, this was something he hadn’t heard anything about and he felt confused but Thran did dial and he waited a few seconds before a deep voice answered. “Yes?” 

Thran’s voice was intense. “Cel, it is me, Thran. We need your help. Daeron has kidnapped Luthien’s kid, and he is heading towards the national park, probably to dump the lad somewhere” 

There was a silence for a few second, then they heard a row of cussing so bad Bard had to gape. “By Satan’s dangling testes, now that twat has done it. I will be there in five, hang on!”

Bard stared at Thran, questions written all over his face. “The hunter?” 

Thran nodded and put the phone away. “Yes, a former marine, worked in the K9 units. Best tracker ever, and a man worthy of a healthy dose respect. He is no joke, the shit he has been through, you wouldn’t believe it.” 

Bard stared at Luthien. “And you know him?” 

Luthien sighed and nodded. “Yes, from before dad introduced me to Daeron, a few years earlier in fact. I met him at a dog show and I sort of spent some time with him to piss off dad, I mean, the guy is a professional killer, I wanted to rattle my old man’s bones a bit”

Thran smiled. “And you did for sure. But we better be ready, Bard, ask Elisa if she has some camera’s near the entrances to the national park” 

Bard did send the request and Beren was on the phone, talking with the people working at the park, he had some problems making them see the severity of the situation. Bard was shocked, taking a kid to a place like that, with bears and cougars and God alone knew what else? Daeron was insane for sure!

Suddenly the front door flew open and a man entered with a dog by his side and Bard gasped and looked for somewhere to seek shelter. The dog was a giant, he had no idea of what breed it was or rather breeds but it was the size of a donkey or even larger. The man wore green and grey, and he had long blonde hair tied in a tight braid and the face was very handsome but hard, there was something in the grey eyes which gave Bard chills. This man had seen death too often, and wouldn’t hesitate facing it again. Bard had seen such people before, something in them was broken, he couldn’t describe it otherwise. Life didn’t matter unless they could live it on the very edge all the time.   
Thran walked down the stairs and took the man’s hand. “Celegorm, I am so glad you could come” 

The man nodded. His eyes did not rest on anyone of them for even a second, this was a gaze which analysed the situation, alert and ready for anything. Bard didn’t doubt that this was a very dangerous person. He nodded towards Luthien with a more friendly expression in his eyes. “So, the amoeba has taken the kid? And he is heading towards the park?” 

Bard swallowed hard. “Beren has asked them to close the gates.” 

Celegorm shook his head. “Won’t do diddely squat, there are hundreds of backroads leading into the park, believe me. If the fucker has planned this he is probably heading into one of those smaller backroads, where there are no cabins and no rangers” 

He petted the dog and the huge animal did pant, the eyes were very intelligent. “I and Huan can find him, I think I may know where the excuse for a human is heading” 

Beren tilted his head. “I have the park manager on the line, the gates are closed as we speak” 

Bard groaned. “Message from Elisa, no camera’s, the last view of the car was at the intersection between the main highway and the road which leads to the artificial lake next to the park” 

Celegorm grinned, a nasty grin. “Bingo, he is going to use the old Mule track. It is a road now but narrow and very hard to find unless you know where it is. We have better get going before he gets there and harms the kid” 

Beren was ready to run to get his jacket but Thran stopped him. “No. The two of you stay here! You may do something silly if that bastard threatens Dior, we can handle this” 

Beren took a deep breath. “Alright, fine, I will stay with her, but wait for a second. We have a bag here ready, with diapers and medicine and all, we were going on a picnic today and the nanny prepared everything before she took the weekend off. “ 

Bard and Thran just nodded and Beren did run off, returning a few seconds later with a small bag. Celegorm did look pissed off and Thran smiled at Bard. “He has got several brothers, had to baby sit a lot as a kid, believe it or not but he is good with kids.” 

Luthien did look terrified still and Bard frowned. “Where is her father?” 

Thran shrugged. “He is at a meeting, left when the party was over, he is probably heading back right now as we speak.”

Celegorm was getting impatient. “Let’s go, it takes an hour and a half at least to get there” 

They followed the man outside and Bard frowned, a monster of a car was parked in the driveway, he had never seen anything like it. It was a sort of pickup but it was built like a tank and he suspected that it was special made. They jumped into the backseat and the dog found its place next to Celegorm. The huge animal did look as if it knew what this was about. Bard managed to smile as the car roared to life. “Ah, what sort of dog is he?” 

Celegorm spun the car around, it handled like a sportscar, which was a miracle considering the size of the thing. “He is a cross breed, there is great Dane in him as well as Irish wolf hound, Russian ovtcharka and probably a few drops of wolf blood too” 

Bard swallowed, it was a dog he wouldn’t have wanted to meet if he had been a criminal trying to flee the law. “So, you met Luthien at a dog show?” 

Celegorm nodded as he steered the massive machine through the traffic, the cars just slid out of the way the same way the red sea had split for Moses and his wand. “Yes, she was there with her Pekingese, terrible animal, yapping constantly. But Luthien is a decent lass, not spoiled at all and very down to earth. I liked her a lot” 

Bard tilted his head. “So, why aren’t you two…you know..?” 

Celegorm chuckled. “Dude, I am gay! I pretended to be her boyfriend just to help her piss off her father, and I did a good job with it too but to be honest, even if I wasn’t gay she wouldn’t be my type, too young and too dependent on being near other people. I prefer the wilds” 

Thran nodded. “Yes, I remember that” 

Celegorm did use the gas and the breaks like a champion, he made the huge vehicle dance through the queues. “I was part of a special unit, we used dogs to track down terrorists. It was a stealth operation, very hush hush. It was fine while I was over there but afterwards I have struggled more. I don’t even get the praise I ought to since I officially didn’t do anything at all. But I have a good job now, tracking injured wildlife and finding idiots who get lost in the woods.” 

Thran cocked his head a bit. “You didn’t drive this monstrosity the last time I met you?” 

Celegorm chuckled “No, a buddy of mine did build her, we used the chassis of a Humvee and some parts from other cars, she is a thing of beauty although my buddy Baldur called her “bride of Frankenstein” I call her Bouncing Betty” 

Bard had to smile. “I bet there isn’t much which can stop this thing” 

Celegorm did grin widely. “You are right, she can survive a anti tank mine just fine and the wheels are special made too, won’t go flat ever. I am very proud of her, she is my baby” 

Thran leaned over. “And she drinks gas like a thirsty camel I am sure!”

Celegorm laughed. “That is the downside of it yes, she has got the engine from a Mack truck, six hundred horse powers and add two hundred when I add nitro and use the turbocharger.” 

Bard yipped. This car was truly a monster. 

Celegorm did leave the highway and found some country road, there he didn’t have to care that much about the speed limit and there was no traffic and he pushed the car but the engine did seem to just purr and Bard did see that the engine temperature in fact dropped as the car was being pushed way beyond a hundred miles an hour. The one building this beast had done a heck of a job. Celegorm did seem intense. “I knew that Daeron was a piece of shit but not that he would do something like this. I bet that his new girlfriend has made him flip” 

Thran did frown, he was hanging on for dear life for Celegorm did turn the heavy car off the road and headed straight over a field, heading for another country road. “A new girlfriend?” 

Celegorm nodded. “Yep, some pretty little thing, she is at least fifty percent silicone, the moron believed that she was a rich heiress but unfortunately she is a gold digger. The family used to be someone, well before the French revolution” 

Thran almost growled. “Yeah, that would make him flip indeed” 

Celegorm did turn onto the other road and Bard was shocked, this man did know how to drive, and not like an ambulance driver or a policeman. This guy did drive like a soldier, and he used the terrain, he did think outside of the box for sure. “There is an old road leading to the old Mule track just where it meets the main road through the area.” 

Bard looked at the clock, Daeron had probably arrived at the park twenty minutes ago if he had driven straight up there and God alone knew what the kid could be going through just now. Celegorm did change gears. “There is a box under the back seat, there is some weapons in it.” 

Bard gaped as Thran opened the box, this was all special forces equipment and Thran lifted a desert eagle calibre 50 out of the box. “Cel, do you have a licence for this? This is a weapon of mass destruction!”

Celegorm just snickered. “Of course, but I prefer my trusty bow. No sounds, no muzzle flash and I would like to see the guy who can wrestle that from me and use it against me “ 

Bard turned his head and now he did see a bow attached to the back of the cab, it did look like an old fashioned longbow but he saw that it wasn’t wood. It had to be some sort of carbon fibre and it did look menacing, painted black with a quiver with black arrows attached next to it. Celegorm did drive like a maniac but strangely enough Bard didn’t get scared. If they did collide with anyone at this speed it would be the other car which would bear the brunt of it for sure. Finally they met the road leading to the lake and Celegorm did break the speed record as they almost flew towards the old Mule track. The road was blocked with a metal gate but the gate was open and the padlock and the chain used to lock it just hung there. Someone had clearly just driven straight through the gate and it wasn’t hard to guess who. Celegorm did slow the beast down, his eyes had changed. Now he was in hunter mode and Huan had tensed up too. 

The road was narrow and surrounded by enormous old gnarly pines, the trees did look like some sort of twisted art and Bard knew that this was a very dry part of the park. The road ended abruptly, at a sheer cliff wall and Celegorm did stop the huge car and used his eyes. He saw the SUV Daeron used right away, it was parked behind a huge boulder out of sight and Bard saw that the hunter did pull a huge bowie knife out of his boot. He did walk over and they heard some tell tale hissing sounds, he had cut apart the wheels.   
“Come on, the tracks are fresh, he was here less than half an hour ago” 

Bard let out a sigh of relief, half an hour, they could still get the kid.   
Thran took a Beretta out of the box but Bard had his service gun and Celegorm took the ominous looking bow and the quiver. Huan was standing by his side, the tail wagging. The hunter did walk around a bit, then he bent down, stared at the thin dusty sand. “Here, he walked here. Huan, seek!”

The dog let out a sort of growling sound and ran off. “Huan is the best tracker I have ever come across, I found him at an animal shelter, he was due to be destroyed that very day for nobody wanted him, he was too goddamn big but I saw his true self. I have never met a braver dog” 

Bard and Thran did run behind Celegorm and Bard was soon in awe, the hunter knew how to track for sure. He did find the tracks even when Daeron had run across bare rock and even the smallest sign was enough for him. The track was heading into a narrow canyon and Celegorm did look tense. “Fuck, that place is a maze, and there are snakes and cats and everything down there”

Bard frowned. “And by cats you mean?” 

Celegorm shrugged. “Cougars, and lynx. I have even come across a grizzly down there once. The park had hired me to find some hiker who had gotten lost, unfortunately the grizzly found him first” 

Celegorm suddenly stopped, held a finger up. “Listen, I hear a kid, crying” 

Thran swallowed visibly. “What do we do?”

Celegorm’s grey eyes turned to flint and steel. “I have a plan, listen carefully!”

 

Daeron had been so sure of himself, he was going to get his vengeance and the bitch would pay. The brat had been easy to snatch out of the crib and Daeron had been in that house enough times to know where the cameras where. They would find out about it sooner or later but he didn’t care. If he could make the whore pay he didn’t care what happened to himself, his dad would surely fix it for him. They wouldn’t put the most gifted musician of all times in jail now would they? He knew just what to do with the goddamn brat, there was a very narrow gorge ahead and he had studied the map and knew where to go but the kid had started bawling the moment he took him out of the cello casket and he didn’t stop. 

And the kid did stink, like a goddamn toilet and he was squirming and the darn thing had even regurgitated all over Daeron’s expensive designer suit. Daeron didn’t have any experience with kids and he had no way of knowing that little Dior in fact was ill and his haphazard way of carrying the poor kid only made it worse. Soon Dior had spewed all over Daeron’s clothes and the musician was ready to just toss the kid inn under a bush or something and return to the car. But he was rather stubborn and not prone to changing his mind, he would drop the kid into the gorge, there it wouldn’t be found until it was too late for sure. 

He found his way between boulders and trees and the kid was bawling even louder than before, he held it awkwardly and tried to ignore the stench. He would have loved to see the face of Luthien when they found that little piece of shit torn all to pieces by coyotes and other scavengers. She could have had him! The greatest musician there was and she chose a goddamn park ranger? A nobody?! Oh this was so well deserved! 

He stumbled over a root and then he heard a sound to his left, it was some sort of growling and he immediately thought of bears but it was no bear. It was the largest dog he had ever seen and he yipped and backed up against the rock next to him. Was this some sort of feral dog? Could it be rabid? The dog walked closer, the teeth were bared and it was staring at him with an eerie sort of determination within its gaze. Daeron squeaked and laid the kid on the ground, perhaps it would go for the smaller easier prey?

The dog ignored the kid and got even closer and Daeron lost it and ran, he bolted like a racehorse out of a starting gate and he was impressively fast considering that he normally never ran. He was heading downhill and he didn’t see that he was being followed. 

Bard did pick up Dior, the kid was weeping and shivering and he did see that the diaper needed to be changed and the poor little one was dehydrated too. Celegorm was busy with Daeron, they could concentrate on the kid now and Thran quickly opened the bag and found that it contained everything they needed, even a bottle with juice and some baby food. Thran had to grin. “A good thing that we both are dads, it isn’t the first time we have had to change some dirty diapers” 

Bard nodded and smiled “I remember when Bain was little, Sophia and I had a system of points. It determined who’s turn it was to do the diaper changing” 

Thran let Dior play with his fingers as Bard laid the little one down onto a blanket and found some wet wipes to clean the bottom. “Oh, how did that work?” 

Bard laughed. “Oh the scale went from –Nasty, which was ten points, via oh shit which was twenty, gehenna which was thirty , holy shit which was forty and Armageddon which was fifty to Ragnarokk which was a hundred. The one with the lowest point score gathered from before had to do the diaper change the next time” 

Thran did find some baby powder and added it to the butt expertly. “So, did you encounter any incidents of the Ragnarokk type?” 

Bard nodded. “Once, the kid had filled his diaper and sat down abruptly. There was shit all the way up to his hairline and I am not kidding!”

Thran had to laugh out loud, it was a bit surreal, there they were, two grown men changing the diapers of a kid in the middle of nowhere while their companion was hunting down the culprit. “Legolas did have a few mishaps too, I cannot forget the one time he had gotten out of his crib and had gotten his diaper off, there was crap everywhere, he had painted with it. We had to toss away a couch, a Persian rug and two rather nice chairs” 

Bard chuckled. “Oh the joy of having kids, never a quiet moment” 

 

Celegorm was following Daeron like a shadow, he was tempted at killing the man but knew that he couldn’t, too bad really. But he could scare the living bjeezes out of him and Huan was doing his job with expert precision. Daeron was being herded into a small gorge with no escape and Celegorm did hear that the man was squealing as the dog got closer and closer. Celegorm did show himself, he knew how to hide and he knew how to suddenly appear out of nowhere. Daeron let out a loud yell as he suddenly saw a tall towering figure which stood on top of a boulder, aiming a bow at him. He was gasping. “Please, the dog, it wants to kill me!”

Celegorm did sneer. “No it don’t. He just want to play, I on the other hand want to kill you but unfortunately too many people know where you are. So I think I just have to be satisfied with giving you a good beating, you goddamn piece of crap!” 

Daeron tried to talk his way out of this. “What, I haven’t done anything to you? I was just going for a walk” 

Celegorm did jump down from the boulder, the bow still steady. “Oh? You kidnapped an innocent kid you bastard. I can tolerate a lot but not that. “ 

Daeron stared at the dog, it was still sneering. “You know that bitch?!”

Celegorm smiled, a very nasty smile. “Oh yes I do, I consider her to be among my best friends, and you…you are something which never should have been allowed to breathe to begin with for it is pollution of this precious planet of ours!”

Daeron squealed again, he was ready to piss his pants. “What are you gonna do with me, please don’t hurt me!”

Celegorm did growl. “You took the most precious thing my friend has, and endangered it so I think it is just fair that I take something of yours, something equally precious!”

Daeron backed up against the rock, he tried to find a way out of there and his mind was going at overdrive but the dog did block his exit and the huge guy hung the bow onto his back and pulled something out of his belt. It was a pair of pliers, the type plumbers use. Daeron started to scream.

 

Bard and Thran had changed the soiled diapers, fed the kid and given him clean clothes and now Dior was sleeping happily in Bard’s arms. Thran did smile gently and helped Bard wrap a blanket around the tiny body. They had given him some medicine too and he wasn’t puking anymore, if they were lucky he would sleep until they got back. Thran lifted his head, staring into the canyon. “Listen, that is the sound of justice” 

Bard heard some infernal screams coming from up ahead. “Not my hands, not my haaaaands!!” 

Thran snickered. “Oh I know Celegorm was a master at torture, Daeron will regret he was ever born!” 

Bard knew it was illegal but for once the cop was asleep. He was pissed too and the thought of this precious little one being handled by that creep made his stomach churn. Whatever horrors Celegorm did subject Daeron to, it was surely well deserved. Bard did carry the baby and Thran took the bag and they headed back towards the car and there they had to wait for a while before Celegorm and Daeron did catch up with them. Daeron was tied up and bloody and Huan was barking and wagging his tail like mad. Dior did sleep soundly now and Celegorm did smile at the kid, he did look very friendly like that but whenever he laid eyes on Daeron the eyes turned to flint once more. Bard had to gape, it looked as if Daeron had been in some bizarre accident for every single finger was broken. Celegorm smiled widely. “Such a good thing I found him in time, he had fallen down a cliff, don’t you agree Daeron?” 

The musician was gasping and his eyes did roll . “Yes…yes…I fell…Th…Thank you…I fell…” 

Thran just shook his head, the fingers had been broken deliberately but he wouldn’t say anything at all. They hauled Daeron into the dog cage which was placed in the back of the pickup and covered it with tarp. Then Celegorm started the engine and Bard and Thran found a good position in the back, Bard still held Dior and he didn’t feel sorry for Daeron at all. They drove back at a leisurely pace, it was no need to hurry now and Thran did text Luthien telling her they were heading back home and that her son was alright. 

They drove into the driveway and Luthien did come running again, she grasped Dior with a scream of relief and ran off with the kid to have him checked by the doctor she had called. Beren was obviously upset and relieved too, he did hug Thran and shook Bard’s hands. “Thank you, thank you so much, without you guys…” 

Celegorm did slide out of the car and pulled the tarp off the cage. “Here it is, the beast. Do what you wish with him!” 

The door at the top of the stairs did open again and Thingol came into view, he was very angry indeed and the eyes were shooting lightening. “Is this the man who took my grandson?” 

Celegorm nodded. “Yes sir, he had a small mishap down in the canyon, it looks as if he won’t be able to play the violin again anytime soon. “

Thingol just nodded. “Excellent, expect a check in your mail soon, you deserve it all” 

He walked down the stairs and Bard saw the hard expression in his eyes. “So you thought you could kidnap my grandson and get away with it? I am very sorry I introduced you to my daughter, I should have smelled it even back then, that you are nothing but filth!”

He waved a hand and two guards came running, grasped the man and pulled him out of the cage, not caring if he did scream in agony. Thingol turned to Thran, his face did reveal a volatile mix of emotions. “We won’t need the help of the police, we can fix this in private. But if you could back me up here?” 

Thran nodded. “Most certainly, Daeron is unfortunately unable to perform for some years, due to a mental breakdown, tragic stuff!” 

Thingol did pat his shoulder. “Good man, I feel guilty. If I hadn’t been such an idiot this would never have happened. I will take a phone call now, tell Daeron’s dad the truth, I am not looking forward to it at all, his parents are decent people, I hope this won’t break them” 

Thran did shake his hand. “Do call us when you know if the little one is okay or not?” 

Thingol smiled “Of course, thank you so much for taking good care of him” 

Bard had to grin too. “It was just a pleasure!” 

Thingol chuckled. “Oh I remember when Luthien was born, pleasure has little to do with it. My darling wife must have some sort of problems with her nose for the smell…ach, I can never forget it!”

Thran laughed out loud. “No dad can, believe me!” 

Celegorm did lean out of the car door. “You all have my number if you need my help again” 

Thingol bowed his head. “Yes, and remember, I am very grateful. You saved my grandson, I will always be in your debt.” 

Celegorm just waved his hand and Huan barked and they drove out of the gate, the dust made the car hard to see. Thingol sighed and turned to the two men. “Don’t worry, we will take care of Daeron, he won’t be allowed to harm anyone again. He is clearly insane” 

Thran sighed. “Yes, I must agree there. He has flipped. “ 

Thingol patted Thran on his back. “Expect an invitation as soon as my wife returns from that expedition of hers, I bet she too wants to thank you both” 

Bard blushed a little and Thran bowed. “We’d better get home, we didn’t tell Jean where we went so I bet she is more than a bit nervous” 

Thingol just smiled and turned around to join his daughter and son in law and Thran went over to their car and started it. “Damn it, if Celegorm hadn’t broken Daeron’s fingers I would have been tempted to do it. Piece of shit!”

Bard sighed. “I agree, to let a bout of jealousy result in that…I cannot understand it, at all” 

Thran smiled, a sad smile. “Show me a sane person who can and I will quit my job!”

Jean had been very worried and was glad when they returned, in time for dinner. The kids were at school and Bard and Thran did take a long hot bath and then they sat down in the living room for some beer. Jean was cooking up something rather exotic and as the kids came storming inn through the door Bard knew that he too would have reacted rather violently if someone did threaten his children. He didn’t envy Daeron, not in the least. 

A week later the newspaper could tell that the famous musician had suffered an accident while hiking with some friends and that the resulting injury had caused him to collapse mentally. His family could only apologize but he was transferred to a private hospital and would stay there indefinitely. Celegorm got a very fat check indeed from Thingol and he was very pleased and Bard and Thran did receive a very nice thank you letter from Luthien and an invitation to use the Grey family’s yacht the next summer, with their kids and all. Bard was thrilled and Thran even more so, the only thing he didn’t look forward to was meeting Melian again for he too did doubt that the legendary orchid had been able to cure her fondness of talking. Dior did recover very well and had no lasting injuries, he was lucky that his rescuers all had been used to kids and Bard did often see the boy and he was such a bundle of sunlight. It felt good knowing that he had been part of the rather improvised rescue mission, but he never spoke of it to his kids. He had participated as a private person, not as a cop and they didn’t need to know the truth about Celegorm and the pliers. No, they didn’t need to know that at all, after all they were kids and he wanted to protect them from the ugliness of the world for as long as he possibly could.


	4. Profit preacher...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bard and Thran are getting involved in a case which hits very close to home, and they have to come face to face with some rather terrible attitudes.   
> This chapter is very graphic and warnings are hereby given, it is nasty!!

Chapter 4: Profit preacher…

Gil was hurrying down the street, she was already five minutes late and that was no good. She had to follow a very tight schedule and if she got delayed it would affect all of her appointments that day. She was wiping sweat from her brow, it was a very warm day and the sun was shining from clear skies, if she hadn’t been working she would have headed for the beach on a day like this.   
And then there was the customer, God darn it, but she would have preferred if that appointment could have been cancelled, indefinitely. In her job she did encounter a lot of people and most of all, a lot of different dogs. She had seen them all, and she was proud to say that yes, she was a dog expert. She knew how to handle canines, of every shape and size, except the one she was going to meet in two minutes tops. Being a dog handler did require that you had people skills as much as dog skills and she was used to being around both common people and the rich and shameless as she preferred to call them. She had taken care of everything from spoiled mutts to beloved and revered pedigrees kept by poor people and she had found out that dogs are dogs, no matter what sort of pay check the owner does receive. She had to grin, she had walked Buffalo earlier that day, Buffalo was a mix breed, part pitbull and Rottweiler and the most terrifying looking dog she knew of. Too bad Buffalo himself thought he was a mouse, he was the greatest coward she had ever encountered and that dog would try to hide in a dustbin or something of equally tiny size if it saw a sparrow or a leaf which moved with the wind. The owner was a huge guy, a stuntman working for a film studio and he loved the dog to bits, even if Buffalo had only one thing in common with his namesake, the ability to run straight off a cliff in sheer panic.   
Gil shook her head, Buffalo was a sweetheart really, a big teddy bear who could harm nothing. The dog she was heading for now was the opposite. It was the most obnoxious piece of shit she knew of and she had no idea of why the owner wanted to keep the menace. Even the local vet had suggested that the mutt was better off dead and that was saying a lot of that vet was very much “pro-life” when it came to dogs. He wouldn’t put a dog down unless it was dying a slow and painful death. Cupcake was just vicious and Gil wondered why the dog had become such a terror, the entire neighbourhood hated it and she had seen people trying to hit it with their cars when it was running around, yapping and attacking everything which moved. Cupcake was also a cross breed, there was Chihuahua in it, some pomerian, probably also a bit of shi-zhu and the biggest contribution to the gene pool had been a pug. It was an abomination, short of breath, short of legs and when it was breathing it sounded like a beached whale. The face was one not even a mother could love and the fur…Gil had almost squealed the first time she saw it, she wondered if this dog had been the inspiration for the gremlins movie for it did resemble one, a bad one.   
She stopped and took a deep breath. Mr Wormsley lived in a row of very nice apartments and his was the last one. It had a small garden on the outside of the house and Gil braced herself. When she reached the gate she knew what would occur, the hairy little goblin would come like a bat out of hell, barking and snarling and she would have to use all her agility to avoid getting bitten. She opened the gate, no Cupcake…That was strange? The dog was usually outside most of the day, Mr Wormsley was afraid it would get bored being locked up indoors and he was away working too, at least for a few hours each day. Mr Wormsley was an actor, or at least, that was what he called himself but Gil had never seen him in any movie she knew of. She stared at the entrance, the door was slightly ajar and she suddenly felt cold. The dog should have come charging by now, it had to have heard her? Was something wrong?   
She walked closer, pushed the door open, not really knowing if she wanted to enter or not. “Mr Wormsley? Cupcake?”   
She stopped with a yip, Cupcake was in its basket in the corner of the hallway and at first glance Gil was sure the piece of malicious fluff finally had said goodbye to this cruel world and went to make hell a wee bit more hellish but then she did see that the dog was breathing. Cupcake was asleep, snoring like an ocean steamer with open valves. Gil had to chuckle, the dog looked even more bizarre asleep. “Mr Wormsley?”   
He ought to be at work at this hour, it was just past noon and he rarely returned home before five o clock. She sort of tip toed past the sleeping little dragon, it was no less dangerous than a real dragon, that was for darn sure. Cupcake had bitten her in the foot once and she had the scars to show for it still. Mr Wormsley had paid the doctor’s bill and he had even offered to pay for a rabies shot, just in case. He knew that Cupcake was insane, so Gil wondered why the guy kept the snarling leprechaun. It could be that Cupcake was the sort of dog nobody in their right mind would adopt and Mr Wormsley was a very timid person, and probably very fond of the dog too, in spite of everything. At least the house was safe, she would like to see the burglar who managed to enter there unscathed.   
The door into the tiny living room was open, she knocked. No reaction, alright. He had to be at home. She walked on. “Mr Wormsley? It is me, Gil. I am here to walk Cupcake but she is asleep”   
The door to Mr Wormsley’s office was open, she realized that he had to be there or in his bedroom and there was no way she was going to enter the latter. She knocked and entered and at first she didn’t even understand what it was that she saw. When her eyes and her brain finally decided that yes, cooperation is both possible and to prefer Gil’s only thought was that she never would have expected anything like that, she had encountered a lot of weird shit visiting people but this was a new record when it came to bizarre and odd. And then she passed out.

 

Bard was staring at the murder victim, trying very hard to keep his face neutral, Judith was making a swift exam of the body and she was whistling as she was working. The house was flooded by police and the crime scene investigators were standing in a corner, all being rather shocked. The young woman who had called it in sat in a couch in the living room, Thran was trying to calm her down and she kept telling them that animal control had to take care of the dog since it was vicious. Bard had seen the sleeping dog, it had been drugged and it did look bizarre but it was nothing compared with its owner. He sort of coughed to get Judith’s attention. “Are you sure this is murder? It cannot be…you know…some rough play gone wrong?”   
Judith chuckled. “Maybe, but we won’t know for sure until I get this gentleman up on my table for a more thorough examination.”   
Bard blinked, the man was laying on his back on his own desk, with his ass on the very edge of it. His legs were strapped into a sort of leather harness which pulled the knees up and out and his arms too were strapped inn. The poor guy had not been able to move an inch. His face was contorted in a grimace of pain and terror, the eyes open and bulging and his mouth was forced open with a ball gag. Spit had dried on his chin and neck and the face was red as a tomato. The guy looked as if he had screamed himself to death. The reason was obvious, something protruded from the man’s anus and it was humongous. Bard hadn’t really understood what it was at first but when he realized the nature of the object he felt slightly sick. Judith was showing the photographer what to make close ups off and Bard swallowed hard. “The…object, it isn’t real? It has to be a sort of replica right?”   
Judith shook her head. “No, it is a real horse cock!”  
One of the investigators scoffed and she rolled her eyes. “Fine, since you are of such a tender and fragile disposition, it is the reproductive organ of a male equine, better? It doesn’t change the circumstances, this guy was sodomized with a horse dong”   
The investigators did cringe and turn a bit grey and Bard cringed too. The thing was huge! “But…how can anyone get something like that? And…wouldn’t it be…you know…limp?”   
Judith just shrugged. “I suppose the thing must have been injected with something which keeps it hard? And I bet you can get this from a slaughterhouse, they sometimes sell the pieces of meat they cannot use to people for dog food. It isn’t legal but who really cares as long as they are paid right?”   
Bard swallowed. “He looks as if he was in a lot of pain”   
Judith nodded. “Yep, so I don’t think this was play gone wrong, I think this was murder, and a very vicious one”   
Bard sort of hissed and returned to the living room, some dude from animal control had come for the dog and he seemed to be convinced that the dog walker was exaggerating when she said the dog was dangerous. It did look like an overgrown mop so Bard could understand that. Thran did smile at the girl who still looked very shaken. “Go home, take the rest of the day off, and if you need any help you have my number. “   
She nodded and scooted out of the door and Thran sighed. “Poor thing got the shock of a lifetime, she seems to be a very nice person though.”   
Bard nodded. “I bet God is laughing up there, if he exist. The shit always happen to the nice people, not the asshats. So, what do you think?”   
Thran tilted his head. “Well, nothing is disturbed, the living room is tidy, no signs of anyone breaking an entry, nobody has been eating or drinking anything here, the dog was sedated. This was premeditated, and very well planned. The harness and the ball gag must have been hidden in a small bag, the ..ehrm…object too.”   
Bard took a deep breath. “Right, premeditated and very vicious. Someone must have hated this guy, with a vengeance and a half”   
Thran smiled, but his eyes were dark. “Yes, this speaks of intense anger, and hatred. But the method…I can’t wrap my head around it, I think…”   
Bard nodded. “Go on?”   
Thran shrugged. “I cannot help but feeling that there is something almost symbolic here, a sort of eye for an eye if you catch my drift?”   
Bard lowered his voice. “And?”   
Thran frowned. “Look at the scene, the victim. It is a very sexual scene, and humiliating too. It speaks of such rage, such…hatred. It takes a lot to treat another person thus”   
Bard bit his lower lip. “Yes, you are so right. This was personal”   
Thran did straighten himself up. “So, we need to check Mr Wormsley’s past, has he done something which can justify such a terrible ending? “   
Bard nodded toward the livingroom. “He has a computer`?”   
Thran smiled. “Right, let us check this out, it could be that we strike gold right away. Let us just hope that he hasn’t got a password”   
The computer was on, just in idle mode and the screen came to life as they moved the mouse, it was an elderly model and Bard sort of frowned. “This is as old as Bain, I am sure of it. I haven’t seen such an ancient PC since I was dating Sophia”   
Thran smiled. “This guy wasn’t very rich, I bet he spent most of his income on the rent.”   
A document was open and Bard entered it, it was a sort of calendar and there were small notifications attached to some dates. And Thran leaned closer to the screen. “This looks like jobs? “   
Bard nodded. “Yes, look here. Bakerstreet 45, Ten o Clock, cereal commercial.”   
Thran pointed at another one. “West Dalton street 2, Nine thirty, extra, period drama”   
He frowned, “I know they are filming some movie these days, something about the depression. It could be that he gets some jobs from the movie company”   
Bard cocked his head. “Yeah, for from this is looks as if Mr Wormsley barely earned enough to eat. He haven’t got any regular work, that is for sure. “   
Thran frowned again, tapped on the screen. “Or does he? Look, each Sunday, a note, no, two notes on some weekends”   
Bard opened one of them. “East Barlington church, Eleven o clock, Reverend H Joseus. Disguise: The old man”   
Both investigators stared at each other. “Disguise?”  
Bard opened the other notice and it said “The usual place, four thirty. Remember the check”   
Thran was intense. “He is an amateur actor, and he is desperate for work. Does this computer have internet connection?”   
Bard checked “Yes, it does”   
Thran was staring at the screen. “Go to youtube, search for this reverend.”   
Bard did and they found several videos, the good reverend H Joseus was really something, an overweight guy in his late fifties with a receding hairline and huge sweat circles under his arms and he was running around on the stage like a caffeinated chicken. A small choir stood at the back, trying to add some class to this charade. The reverend was yelling, shaking his arms, pulling the crowd with him into a religious frenzy. Bard sort of grimaced, he had seen that sort of show before. Soon the man would start asking for money to save peoples souls and bingo, at ten minutes and forty seconds the reverend raised his arms to heaven, breathing hard. “Listen, do you hear it good people, do you hear Christ calling? He is calling for you brothers and sisters, he is calling for you to help us save souls. Give brothers and sisters, give and watch saaatan squirm as the money fills our account, hear him grooooaaan in agony as we pull yet another soooouulll out of his filthy grasp!”  
The crowd was rather loud, shouting hallelujah and amen and Thran rolled his eyes. He knew that this was a sort of mass hysteria, carefully built and pushed into action by the reverend. The man on stage reached out as if to embrace everyone there. “Come forth, come forth my lambs and I will heal your ailments, I will cleanse your souls”   
The crowd was still shouting and the girl of the choir did look rather bored, they had to be used to this but they did sing rather well, although way too loud in order to be able to be heard at all. A person appeared in the isle, staggering forth. It was an elderly man with rather filthy clothes and he was wearing black glasses and carried a white cane. He almost stumbled in the carpet, collided with a huge decoration carrying some candles and when he was to shake the reverend’s hand he missed and almost punched the reverend in the gut. Bard scoffed. “If that man is blind then so am I”   
Thran nodded. “Watch”   
The reverend placed his hand onto the man’s head, raising his voice. “Hear me O Christ, save this man from his blindness, driiive away the demons in the name of God. I demand the blindness gone, be gone devilish disease”  
He grasped the man’s head with both hands and shook it so bad Bard almost expected to hear the poor bloke’s teeth chatter. Then he let go and the man was shaking all over, as if he was having some sort of seizure. The reverend lifted his arms. “Go now brother, and be healed! Be healed!”  
The old man took off his glasses, blinked and looked very surprised and then he sort of gasped and let out a small shriek. “I can see, I can see, I am healed. Praise the lord!”  
He dropped the cane and the glasses and ran out of the church, like a kid.   
Thran turned to Bard, “That was Mr Wormsley or you can call me a toad. Let us check the other videos too”   
After about half an hour they had found several videos and in each and every one some person got miraculously healed, and it was always Mr Wormsley in disguise. He was once a wounded soldier, then he was in a wheelchair, he was a very old man, then a fat woman! He was a master at disguise but his height was the same each time and he didn’t use the same disguise twice at the same place. The reverend did move around a bit and some creative searching on the net revealed that his preaching did create an income each year which made Thran gasp. “Oh God, the world does really want to be fooled.”   
Bard did open the folders on the computer and found more videos and more so, Mr Wormsley had in fact left comments on each of them, criticising his own performance. “Look, the first one we saw? “Overdone, less staggering next time, remember blind, not Parkinsons” He is trying to improve himself”   
Thran nodded. “He sees this as a way of training, of another step on the way towards a real job”   
Bard nodded. “Yes, but that other notice, same place? What can that be?”   
Thran shrugged. “There aren’t any clues left on the computer?”   
Bard sighed. “Know what, we bring it back to the station, Elisa can take a look at it. If there are some hidden files here she can find them for sure”   
Thran stared at the wall behind the computer, it was covered with newspaper articles, regarding movies being shot, social events and stuff like that. He tilted his head and started moving them aside, there was a picture hidden behind it all, a woman standing on a podium, carrying a huge bouquet of roses, smiling widely and waving an arm at the photographer. Bard blinked. “Ah…?”   
Thran nodded “Ah indeed, I wonder…”   
He took the picture off the wall, turned it around. Something was written on it with a sloppy handwriting. “Miss Dahlia, The emperor, June 19th. First place”   
Thran looked intense. “The emperor is a night club, famous for drag shows, I think Mr Wormsley was a drag queen at one point of his career.”   
Bard felt a chill run down his spine. “Was he gay? Could this be a hate crime?”   
Thran sighed. “I hope not, nothing is more dangerous than those who think that their deeds are justified, no matter how grotesque they are.”   
The technicians had done their job and the body was being removed and transported to the morgue, Judith had looked very eager and Bard knew that the woman had a very odd view upon what was interesting and not. He guessed her job was responsible for that. They took the computer with them and left the remaining cops with the job of closing down the building. They had work to do, if Mr Wormsley had family they had to be notified and what was that other job with no description? They would have to wait and see if Elisa and Erestor managed to find something on that computer. 

Bain and Legolas were boys, and boys are the same all over the world. This day the schools were closed because of some sort of meeting which all the teachers had to go to and the kids were naturally thrilled. Jean didn’t have time for the boys so they had brought Jean’s new dog Perky with them out onto the fields. The farm owned a lot of land now and they loved to go around, exploring the small valleys and holts and old abandoned farm buildings. This day was very windy and they wore thick jackets as they ran around, having fun. They were heading for an old barn which lay not far from the main road, Jean hadn’t used it in years but there was hay stored in it and Bard was rather sure that it contained some sort of treasure. For young lads everything interesting could be defined as just that. The barn was rather large and well built, Jean had thought about transforming it into a new stable but so far it had only been an idea, not something she had really considered. Bain did open the door, it was old but well made and it didn’t make much noise. The barn was separated into two areas, one with hay and one with old farming equipment and the boys were heading over to the equipment area. There were all sorts of old stuff there, and some of it was old indeed. Bain pointed at a huge machine and grinned. “That is a horse drawn combine harvester, they needed twenty horses to make it move”   
Legolas nodded and his eyes were large, he had never seen such stuff before and he was fascinated. They were rummaging around for a while but suddenly the dog started to bark. It was a young dog and rather energetic and Bain told it to be silent. Perky was a border collie and he had not yet learned how to be obedient and he was jumping up and down, staring at the hay. Bain frowned, there was something there, hanging from the ladder? It was a small piece of fabric, a handkerchief or something like that and he picked it up. Then he saw footprints in the dust. Someone had been there and it wasn’t just one set, that someone had been walking around there a bit. He felt scared right away, was there a burglar in there with them? He turned to Legolas. “Legolas, there is someone here!”  
Legolas froze and his eyes got huge. “Are you serious?”   
Bain nodded and crouched down. “See? Someone has left that handkerchief on the ladder. And over a that table…”   
There was a small table standing by the wall and there were some stuff on it, a sort of sack and a thermos and a box, probably a lunch box. Legolas whispered. “What are we to do?”   
Bain did look nervous. “I don’t know? Can we just…”   
Legolas was squinting. “We have to check this out, there is hay here. What if that someone sets the entire barn on fire?”   
Bain swallowed. He wasn’t that brave now, if there was someone in there it could be some dangerous criminal, or some deranged lunatic! Legolas stepped forth. “I am light, I can climb the ladder, I won’t make much noise and I am fast too”   
Bain made a grimace. “Oh, okay, but be careful!”  
Legolas was climbing up very fast but quietly, he was a slender boy and didn’t weigh that much yet. He reached the top of the wall and peeked over it. He gestured for Bain to join him, holding a finger over his mouth. Bain climbed after his step brother with his heart way up in his throat, he felt terrified for if something bad happened he would be the one to blame since he was the oldest of the two. He joined Legolas at the top of the ladder and they stared into the hayloft, it was full to the brim and in the middle of the hay they saw someone, covered with blankets and obviously sleeping. Legolas whispered. “It is a girl!”  
Bain nodded. “Yes, and she looks as if she is my age, not much older”   
She was rather dirty and why was she here? A girl that age should be at home, was she a runaway? Bain swallowed hard. This was just a barn, not a place to live and it was cold there. And did the girl have food? He made a split second decision. He crawled into the hay and made his way towards the girl, she was buried in the hay with the blankets wrapped around her and Bain took a deep breath. She did look very young indeed and pretty too, with long dark brown hair and a very sweet face but her expression was one of fear and sorrow. He reached out and shook her gently. “Miss? Don’t be afraid, but wake up, please”   
The girl made a mewling sound, then she sort of jerked and woke up and then she screamed. Bain backed away in shock and she stared at him with huge brown eyes. “Easy, I am not dangerous. It is just…this is my grandma’s barn and …you shouldn’t really be in here”   
The girl was trembling, she was thin, Bain saw that now, and her eyes were sunken. She did look ill. “Please…don’t tell anyone I am here, please”   
The voice was very low and a bit hoarse and she was on the verge of bursting into tears. “I won’t do any harm, I promise, I just…I just need a place to be”   
Bain sat down in the hay again. “Listen, I am not dangerous alright? I don’t want to harm you in any way but what are you doing here? It is so cold here, and do you have food? I am Bain by the way, and that over there is my step brother Legolas”   
The girl sniffled. “I am…Lilly.”   
Bain smiled. “Nice to meet you Lilly, why are you hiding in the barn?”   
She pulled her blankets tighter around herself and then Bain saw something which made him gasp. “Oh God, you are…”   
She nodded. “Pregnant, yes”   
Bain swallowed. “Is that why…”   
Lilly nodded. “Yes, mother…she want’s to…I cannot tell you more…”   
Bain knew that not all parents were kind like Bard and Thran, but this was just terrible. “Your mom, is she a bad one?”   
Lilly nodded and looked down. “She…she thinks I am an abomination, that I have sinned. She…hates me”   
Bain frowned. “What? That is terrible. But you are cold, are you well? You look so grey”   
The girl sort of sighed. “I don’t know, I haven’t seen a doctor, mom thinks doctors are the servants of Satan.”   
Bain gaped. “What?!”  
She made a vague gesture. “She thinks that only God should be allowed to heal”   
Bain rolled his eyes. “Oh, your mother is one of those!!”  
Lilly bit her lower lip “Yes, and she….she will give the baby to someone else, for money”   
Legolas was crawling into the hay as well. “So you fled to avoid that?”   
Lilly nodded, her eyes were filled with tears. “Yes, I cannot go back to her, she is…evil!”  
Bain saw that she was trembling and he reached out, touched her forehead. “You are so warm, you have a fever. You cannot stay here, you need a doctor”   
Lilly shook her head. “No, please you don’t understand. They will send me back to her! I cannot go back, I’d rather die”   
Bain took her hand. “Listen, our dads are police officers, and if you mom is that bad nobody is gonna send you back, I promise. Grandma is a very smart woman, and very kind . She can help you, I bet she knows a doctor who will help you and not alert anyone. How old are you by the way?”   
Lilly sighed. “Fifteen”   
Bain gaped. “We are of the same age then. Know what, you come with us back home, grandma will get you warmed up again and she is an amazing cook too”   
Lilly did blink. “Can you swear that nobody will send me back?”   
Bain nodded and smiled. “Scouts honour, it will be alright. You need a good meal and a good bath.”   
Lilly tried to smile. “Oh a bath, I would like that!”  
Legolas offered her his hand. “Come on then, we can get the blankets later.”   
She got out of the hay and Bain stared. “How far along are you really?”   
He was shocked for her belly was very large. “I don’t know really, eight months?”   
She was crawling through the hay and Bain did see that she appeared to be very tired, he felt that something was very wrong, she wasn’t telling them everything for sure. They held the ladder as she climbed down and she was almost wobbling as they walked out of the barn. Bain put his arm around her as they walked back towards the farm, she was limping and in the daylight they really saw that she was pale and sickly.   
They reached the farm after a long and very tiresome walk for she had to stop rather often to breathe and rest and Bain nodded at Legolas. “Run ahead and warn grandma, tell her to get the bath ready and to find some food”   
Legolas did nod and ran off, he was very fast and before long he disappeared into the new main building. Perky was at his heels the whole time, yapping and barking. He ran indoors and Jean was busy preparing some vegetables for dinner. She frowned. “What is the hurry young man?”   
Legolas had to stop to catch his breath. “Jean, we need your help, we went to the barn and there was this girl there, she is hiding for her mom is a bitch and she needs help, a doctor I think. She is…she is knocked up”   
Jean gaped. “Slow down, is there a girl in the barn? Pregnant? How old is she?!”  
Legolas managed to catch his breath again. “Fifteen, please, she is sick, and she doesn’t want to go back to her mom, the bi… her mom wants to sell her baby”   
Jean blinked, then she suddenly got very effective. “Is she on her way over here now?”   
Legolas nodded. “Yes, Bain is helping her, but please, do not let anyone know, she will run away again if she think we will betray her. She is so cold and thin and she is very very scared.”   
Jean nodded and they heard steps outside now. Jean opened the door and she let out a gasp when she saw that girl, she was in obvious trouble and she helped Bain push and lift her inside. Jean saw a small and cute face with way too large eyes and the poor kid was shivering like a leaf in the wind. Jean helped the girl sit down on a chair. “Now, sit here and I will get you a big cup of cocoa and then I will pour you a hot bath and find some clean clothes for you. Those rags are atrocious”   
The girl stared at her with scared eyes and Jean’s maternal instincts kicked inn. “Listen, I will not tell anyone you are here alright? You can trust me little one. What is your name?”   
The girl tried to smile but there was such pain in her eyes. “Lilly.”   
Jean stroked the dirty hair. “I am Jean, let’s get those cold old boots off of you and then we’ll see if you can get warm again”   
Jean made a cup of cocoa and added a lot of sugar, the kid looked as if she needed it and Bain did tell Jean that Lilly didn’t even know how far along she was. By the looks of it she could have the baby anytime soon. Lilly did drink the cocoa as if she was starved and then Jean got her a plate of stew left from the day before. That too was eaten with ravenous appetite and Jean saw bruises on the girl’s wrists. She felt how wrath started to build up within her. She smiled and Bain had been sent off to fill the tub. “If you are finished eating we can get you clean, how about that?”   
Lilly nodded and Jean showed her the way. The bathroom was large and very luxurious and Lilly appeared to be in awe of the shiny tiles and the warm water as she slowly got rid of the soiled clothing. “You must be rich”   
Jean smiled. “Well, I am not that rich, the house was paid for by the husband of my former son in law. They live here you see, they are the dads of Bain and Legolas and there are also two girls living here”   
Lilly gasped. “Husband? Oh are they…gay?”   
Jean smiled and nodded. “Yes, does that bother you?”   
Lilly looked down. “No, not really. I don’t think it is wicked to be gay, mom on the other hand…”   
Jean sat down and took Lilly’s hand. “She thinks it is wrong?”  
Lilly sighed and nodded. “She thinks it is a terrible sin, an abomination. She…she thought I was…that way…so she punished me…”   
Jean felt horrified, she had to close her eyes for a moment. “How did she punish you Lilly? You can tell me, I will not tell anyone unless you want me to”   
Lilly hid her face in her hands. “I…I have this friend, Anna, she is so nice but we are just friends, not…you know, lesbians or anything. But mom, she…she was sure that I was…doing things with Anna. And so she had one of the guys in her church…”   
Jean felt dizzy, no, this couldn’t be true, nobody could be that cruel? “Oh God Lilly, don’t tell me that…”   
Lilly sobbed “She said that it would convert me, make me pure again, make me…normal”   
Jean heaved for air, she was being overcome with emotions but first things first. Lilly needed a bath, then a doctor and then Bard and Thran would receive a phone call and she wouldn’t rest until this so called mother was being punished, even if she had to take the law into her own hands. She got up. “Come now, the bath is ready.”   
Lilly got up and Jean was horrified, the girl was skin and bones and the stomach was very large. She did look sick, and Jean had a terrible suspicion. She helped Lilly into the water and hissed from the sight of all the bruises. “There you go dear, will you be alright on your own or do you want me to stay?”   
Lilly blushed. “I can manage, please.!”  
Jean petted her head. “There is shampoo and soap in that corner over there, and I have found some nice towels. Just take your time, you need it”   
Lilly smiled and released her hair which had been tied into a sort of bun, she had very long hair and it did look nice but was filthy and a bit stiff. Jean left the bathroom and turned to face Legolas and Bain. “It was very good you found her, she would not have made it alone for very much longer. Now, you stay here, make sure she doesn’t go anywhere. I will make a phone call. She needs a doctor I fear and I know one who won’t cause us problems.”   
Bain frowned. “Who?”   
Jean smiled. “Dr Elrond, do you remember him?”   
Bain sort of lit up. “OH yes, I remember. He is the guy who managed to make Mrs Barnsley shut up about her anti vaccine campaign”   
Jean nodded. “The very same. Now if you’ll excuse me”   
She grasped her phone and sat down in a corner, waiting for connection. Elrond was one of the best paediatricians in the city and very famous and he had been a friend of hers for years since he too was very fond of horses and had bought some foals from her. Jean swallowed, this would be a very tough conversation for sure but a needed one, she was afraid that the girl had some sort of complication. 

Bard and Thran had returned to the station and left the computer in the skilled hands of Erestor and now they were heading down to the basement. Judith had been working on the body for a while and they were eager to find out if this was what it appeared to be. Judith stood there with blood to her elbows when they entered the morgue, she had an expression on her face which only could be described as disbelief. “Ah, there you are guys, I am just done. It was murder indeed. Phew, of all the shit I have seen…”   
Bard swallowed. “So, cause of death?”   
Judith made a grimace. “Easy to find, internal bleeding. He had been ripped apart”   
Thran cringed visibly and Bard hissed. “The horse…thing?”   
Judith shook her head. “No, the horse cock did block the…exit. It didn’t let the blood out, but the initial injury was done with something way harder. Probably a baseball bat or something like that. And then the horse willy was stuffed in afterwards, and that wasn’t all folks, no! The culprit had rubbed red pepper powder onto the willy, to make sure it hurt even worse”   
Bard and Thran stared at each other, eyes huge with horror. “Oh God, that is sadism”   
Judith pulled off her gloves. “Most certainly. The one who did this really wanted Mr Wormsley to suffer, a lot!”  
Thran frowned. “What can make someone hate anyone that bad?”   
Judith sighed. “Beats me, but I am rather sure that whoever it was must have been carrying a lot of wrath.”   
Bard tried to think like an investigator. “So, was there anything else you noticed about him?”   
Judith shook her head. “Mr Wormsley was a healthy young man, a strong heart, no liver problems, no sign of drug abuse. The only problem he had was some bad teeth. They must have hurt like hell so he did have a terrible economy. I am rather sure that he couldn’t afford a dentist at all”   
Bard stared at the body on the table. “The horse…wiener, ah…”   
Judith washed her hands. “Most likely from a slaughterhouse yes, it was injected with some sort of silicone material, it was hard as a…well, as a cock. I think it may have been frozen at some point in time, the tissue did seem to have thawed at least once. “  
Thran sighed. “The culprit isn’t from this city now is he, if he was he wouldn’t need to freeze the thing”   
Judith nodded. “You are right, there is a slaughterhouse here in town, a rather large one too but they don’t slaughter horses, I know that for a fact. They were banned from killing equines five years ago, someone smuggled a camera inside and they saw things which…well, let’s just say I couldn’t watch that video without crying”   
Bard nodded “I heard about that, Jean was so angry she was steaming back then”   
Thran took a deep breath. “So, what do we do now?”   
Bard pointed at the exit. “We see if Erestor and Elisa has found something yet, then we go to The emperor, maybe someone there knows Mr Wormsley and can tell us something useful”   
Thran smiled. “Alright, let’s go”   
Elisa was by her computer and she was chatting with Erestor live, the hacker had apparently torn the computer apart in less time than it would take a cat to tear up a roll of toilet paper. She smiled at them as they approached and pointed at the screen. “Erestor has found that other appointment of Mr Wormsley, and several files too. It is rather…well, bad”   
Thran frowned. “Bad how?”   
Elisa made a grimace. “Well, I bet that he was gay, or perhaps bi right? But he sort of sold his soul here, just watch, this is just…wrong”   
She pushed a button and a video opened and started playing. Bard and Thran stared at an image of the late Mr Wormsley, he was holding a bible and looked very…groomed. His hair was well combed and she was wearing a nice shirt and looked like a poster image of the perfect white male. But the things he said? Bard almost choked, how could anyone really sink this low? It was one thing to need money but this?  
Thran swallowed hard. “If anyone in the gay community found out about this…”   
Bard nodded. “Yes, that is…just betrayal the way I see it”   
Elisa smiled, but the smile wasn’t nice. It was more of a sneer really. “The one who hired him is a woman by the name of Rachel Whitley, she is a conversion therapist, or at least that is what she claims to be. I have checked her on the web, she offers to “fix” kids the parents suspect of being gay”   
Thran went pale, Bard had never seen such an expression on his face before. “I have seen kids who escape from such “therapists”. They usually suffer from deep psychological trauma, and it takes years to clean up the mess.”   
Bard felt a bit faint. “So Mr Wormsley made a living pretending to be a convert, to lure more people into sending their kids to this woman? Oh I start to feel that the murderer maybe wasn’t so deranged after all”   
Thran’s eyes were like flint. “Alright, we will go to the nightclub and then this Rachel Whitley will receive a small visit, and it won’t be a polite one”   
Elisa sort of growled. “It says here, she has successfully converted at least a hundred people, and she claims to be able to cure kids of addictions and a lack of respect too”   
Bard looked down, the image on the screen was of a woman with a very stiff smile and hard eyes and she was holding a bible as if it was a weapon ready to strike down onto some unfortunate sinner. “Yes, but we will bring some officers along, I am not so sure that I can keep my cools if that woman truly is such a bitch”   
Thran went over to his office and got his coat and Bard got his gun too, just to be sure. Elisa waved her hand at them. “If that woman gives you trouble give her a kick from me, a hard one!”  
Bard grinned and they ran down to the garage. Thran was very quiet as they drove off to the night club. It was closed at this hour but there would always be people there, cleaning and preparing the place for the night to come. Bard felt the need to break the silence. “Darling, this is bothering you”   
Thran nodded. “Sure as hell it is bothering me, this whole…thing! It is just so sick, so goddamn medieval! I have seen examples Bard, people who have spent their lives believing that they are sick and twisted, that they are sinners. It has ruined so many lives”   
Bard sighed, “I know, I cannot understand how these people think”   
Thran frowned. “How so?”   
Bard shrugged as he slowed down in front of an intersection. “I mean, they swear that God has created everything there is, and that all is under his will. Then there shouldn’t be anything wrong about being the way you are created. If you follow that train of thought their homophobic rantings are blasphemy since they dare to claim that God has made a mistake and thus aren’t perfect! ”   
Thran did look a bit confused but then he shook his head. “Oh but these people do believe that you chose to become gay, as a kid even. It isn’t something you are born with, but something you chose to do”   
Bard rolled his eyes. “We do live in the twenty first century and such attitudes does still exist, it is amazing.”   
Thran scoffed. “There are people who swear that the earth is flat and that gravity is a government conspiracy so why not? Mankind has been devolving for the last decades for sure”   
They pulled into the parking lot next to the nightclub and Thran took a deep breath. “Bard, I used to go here, some years ago. Some may recognize me”   
Bard raised an eyebrow. “Really? Oh now you have managed to awaken my curiosity”   
Thran sort of grimaced and straightened his jacket before they went up to the employee’s entrance. There was a camera there and Bard ringed the door bell and held his badge up. In less than two minutes the door was opened by a short redhead with freckles and a very cute face. He stared at the two, a bit nervously and Bard guessed his age to be somewhere in the early twenties. “Yes, how may I be of assistance?”   
Bard put down the badge again. “We are investigating the death of a person we do believe was either working here or a patron of this place”   
The young man nodded. “Oh, do come in. I am new you see so I don’t know anyone really but Mr Farnsley, the boss, he does!”   
Thran sort of hid a grimace and they followed the young man through a corridor and up a few stairs. They entered behind a stage where some stage workers were struggling with some huge speakers which obviously were to be moved and a tall dark haired man with a rather rough face and a majestic appearance were giving orders. The lad walked over and the man did appear to be a bit annoyed until he turned around and saw Thran. Then his face did split into a wide grin and he almost came running over, obviously very glad to see the profiler. “Gods, Thran, I thought you had crept into a hole somewhere and died! Why haven’t you visited us? Oh, I heard that you have gotten married?”   
Thran smiled, and he was blushing. “Ah yes, Boromir Farnsley, this is Bard Bowman, my husband…”   
Boromir gawked, then he grasped Bard’s hand and shook it, vigorously. “Oh wonderful, now how did you come by this piece of candy Thran? He is completely delectable!”  
Bard blushed now, deeply! Thran tried to choke his laughter, Bard did look so shocked. “At work, we do work together now.”   
Boromir was still staring at Bard with the expression of a hungry squirrel who has seen some tempting nuts high up in a tree. “You had some questions?”   
Thran nodded. “Yes, a Mr Wormsley? He was a drag artist, at least for a while”   
Boromir sort of scowled. “Ah, him! Please, follow me, we can talk in my office”   
Bard saw that Thran tensed up a bit, that had to mean something. Boromir waved his hand at the workers again. “Go on lads, those speakers has to be in the right spot, miss Ticha is performing tonight and the sound must be perfect!”  
The office was just behind the stage and Bard saw that this nightclub was rather small, but the space had been used to the max and it did look very intimate and cosy. The office was so small it was barely room for three grown men there and Boromir sat down by his desk and ran his fingers through his hair, he did look a bit tired all of a sudden. “Mr Wormsley haven’t been here for the last eight months, he was among our best performers but he sort of clashed with one of the divas of this place and got frozen out. And if he tried to return now he would have been tarred and feathered for sure”   
Thran blinked. “People know?”   
Boromir made a nasty grimace. “About the way he makes a living? Oh yes, news spreads fast here, and many sees him as a deceiver and rotten apple in the barrel. He would not be welcome, that is for sure. I take it that he was murdered?”   
Bard nodded and tried to look professional. “Yes, in a most vicious manner.”   
Boromir sighed. “Too bad, really too bad. He was a very gifted young man, a great talent but he did always question himself and his abilities and to some, well, that sort of insecurity is like poison.”   
Thran nodded slowly. “Do you think that anyone here could have taken it as far as murder?”   
Boromir shrugged. “I don’t think so, but one of his previous friends are here now, preparing for the show tonight. You can talk to him now if you like. He may have kept some contact with Mr Wormsley after he left”   
Thran smiled. “That would be good yes.”   
Boromir grasped his phone and dialled a number, waited for a second or two. “Burt? My office, now”  
He smiled at the two. “He ought to be here asap”   
They heard the sound of running feet and suddenly a slender short guy burst in through the door. “Where is the fire…oh, I am sorry”   
He came to a standstill and looked a bit confused. Boromir made a gesture. “Burt, these two gentlemen are from the police, apparently someone has killed Mr Wormsley”   
Burt gaped, his eyes got huge. “What? Oh goddamn it, I spoke to him…three days ago?!”  
Bard blinked. “Really? Do tell please”   
Burt sat down on the desk, he appeared to be truly shaken by the news. “Ah, oh lord, this is…I cannot even… well, he called me to let me know that he was planning on quitting the job for that horrible woman, uh you do know about his work yes? For that…piece of filth conversion therapist?”   
Bard and Thran nodded and Burt continued. “He was getting tired of it, she treated him like shit the whole time but the pay was good, and he needed the money too. But there was something else too, I think someone had threatened him but he wouldn’t say who, or why. And that woman had apparently been less than pleased when he told her he was quitting. It is hard to get someone to pretend to be a “cured” ex homo you know”   
Thran nodded. “I can only imagine yes, and the staff here?”   
Burt frowned. “Huh? Oh, you mean if anyone here could have wanted to harm him? Sure, we all wanted to place a boot up his rear for having taken such a terrible job but I don’t think anyone would want to kill him because of it. That would be just…wrong. I mean, he was desperate and he knew that it was wrong but we have all been there right, broke desperate and ready to ride with the devil if it brings a few bucks.”   
Thran sighed. “Right, so then the most likely culprit is the one with the threats, and this Mrs Whitley.”   
Burt nodded. “Yes, please find the one who did this? It is…terrible to think about. How…how did he die?”   
Thran took a deep breath. “Burt, for your own sake, you do not need to know. It is rather nasty, and I have seen stuff you wouldn’t believe so believe me, you don’t want this information”   
Burt swallowed. “A-alright.”   
Boromir got up. “I will keep my ears open, if anyone hears something…”   
Thran smiled, a warm smile. “That would be wonderful, thank you!”  
Burt did look very sad as they left the office and Thran had a hard expression on his face. “We must go to see this Mrs Whitley now, call for reinforcements”   
Bard grasped the police radio and sent two squad cars to the address, both the men were quiet as they drove off. The address was in one of the best neighbourhoods of the city and it was a grand house with several floors and a huge garden. It was very well kept but Bard did sense something the moment they drove in through the gate. Thran was lifting his head, as if he smelled something wrong there and Bard felt that tingling between his shoulder blades. Something was very wrong there. They had to wait for just a minute before the two cars entered behind theirs and four officers did accompany them up the stairs. Thran did ring the bell and after a while the grand door opened and the woman they had seen on the internet page did open the door. She did look like a person who thinks the world of herself and her attitude was very aggressive judging from the way she looked at the two investigators. Thran smiled, a very soothing smile. “Sorry to bother you ma’am but we have a few questions regarding a man who has worked for you, a Mr Wormsley.”   
The woman tilted her head, her eyes were dark and cold and Bard just knew it, this was a very bad person. “So? Yes, he did some work for me, but he decided to look for something else to do instead.”  
Thran smiled still. “And that was alright with you?”   
She sort of scowled. “Yes, he was getting boring, and I had used his image too many times, I needed a new face so it was just fine by me”   
Thran sent Bard a very swift glance, she wasn’t lying. Bard did notice that the bench in the hallway was covered with pictures, most were of Mrs Whitley herself but there was also a picture of a young girl with long dark hair. “What lovely pictures, is that your daughter?”   
Mrs Whitley sent him a rather burning glance, “Yes, it is none of your business but that is my daughter Lilly, she is with her grandmother right now”   
Thran nodded. “I see, and your husband?”   
Mrs Whitley scowled, and Bard remembered having seen the old movie Carrie, this woman did remind him of Carrie’s mother. The same over zealous dark and condemning religion. “He left me, I bet he burns in hell. Was there anything else, officers?”   
She almost spat the last word out and Thran just bowed his head politely. “No ma’am. You don’t know if anyone has threatened Mr Wormsley?”   
She sneered. “If someone did I bet he deserved it, goddamn sodomite, offspring of Satan”   
She slammed the door shut and Bard stared at Thran who shrugged. “She is hiding something, but I don’t think it has something to do with Mr Wormsley”   
Bard nodded and frowned. “I think so too.”   
They turned around and walked down the stairs, the four other officers did return to their cars and started pulling out of the driveway and Bard opened the car door. He had a hard time accepting that such a bigoted and harsh person could live in such a luxurious place. Thran suddenly froze, a black cat strolled over the front lawn and it was heading for the entrance, where it walked through the door as if it was a ghost. Bard felt his stomach drop as they suddenly heard a loud scream followed by first two and then a third gunshot. Thran ran up to the entrance again and tried to open the door but it was locked. Bard ran towards it and kicked at the solid lock but it didn’t budge. “There has to be some other entrance, hurry”   
Thran ran around the corner and Bard followed, swearing under his breath. Thran was too bold for his own good at times. They found an open door which lead into a sort of living room and rushed inside, Bard first with his gun drawn. Mrs Whitley was laying on her back, her arms spread and a pool of blood was spreading around her. She was dead, nobody survives getting shot in the head in such a manner. But on top of her lay several pages from a torn up bible and the two first shots had been placed in her chest and abdomen.   
Bard grasped his radio and called it inn, frantically. Thran did look at the scene and then they both saw the cat again, sauntering towards the stairs, looking at them as if it was asking them to follow. Bard nodded. “Go, we cannot do anything here now, the culprit must have used some other door.”   
They followed the cat upstairs, until they reached what could only be described as a loft and there the cat disappeared but they both felt it, a stench of excrement, fear and unwashed bodies. The doors were locked with padlocks and Bard heard faint sounds coming from inside of the two rooms. There were no keys there but Thran did find a crowbar in a box of tools someone had left behind and snapped the locks off with a grunt. Bard opened the door hesitantly, the room was pitch dark and he turned on his flashlight and the beam revealed at least seven pairs of eyes staring at them from narrow cots. The room was freezing cold, it stank and the seven kids were all chained to the beds. Thran moaned and Bard had to turn around, so this was Mrs Whitley’s conversion therapy, he had seen images of prisoners from world war 2 KZ camps who had looked way healthier than these seven boys. 

Jean had managed to get a hold of Elrond, the doctor was coming over and he had almost exploded when Jean explained the situation. Lilly had gotten dressed again and she did look a bit better but not much. The dirt was gone, not the emaciated look and the fatigue in her eyes. Jean started to prepare dinner, Tilda and Sigrid would get home soon and she knew that the girls would be hungry. Sigrid had taken her sister shopping and their grandmother reckoned that the girls would have more than enough to talk about this evening. Bain and Legolas were sitting by the door, they took their orders seriously for sure. Jean had almost finished the huge kettle of soup when a car appeared, it was a nice one but not overly so and the man who stepped out of the car was somewhere in his early fifties and looked very distinguished with long dark hair which only had a few streaks of grey and kind grey eyes. He wore a rather worn suit and appeared to be upset still. He sort of straightened himself up before he walked over to the door and knocked. Lilly did look nervous at first but Jean just smiled and calmed her down. “It is no danger dear, it is the doctor I told you about remember? He is very nice and will help you”  
Jean opened the door and Elrond stepped inside, he was carrying a small suitcase and he saw Lilly and smiled, a very warm and soothing smile. Jean saw that his eyes darkened though, and he put the suitcase down. “Hello, I am doctor Elrond, and you must be Lilly? Nice to meet you young lady”   
Lilly did swallow and tried to smile, but she was too nervous and it became a grimace. “N…nice to meet you too”   
Elrond sat down next to her. “So, you don’t feel well? And you are worried about your baby?”   
Lilly just nodded and Elrond looked at her. “You are way too thin, and you look very pale and grey, haven’t you seen the sun for weeks?”   
She shook her head. “Mom…mom kept me locked up…”   
Elrond sent Jean a look filled with quiet rage. “That is too bad Lilly, but we will do all we can to help you. First of all, may I examine you? I will take your blood pressure, listen to your heart, maybe take a blood sample and listen to your baby’s heartbeat?”   
Lilly started to shiver a bit. “A-alright, here?”   
Jean shook her head. “No, we do have a room where it can be done, come on.”   
Jean showed them the way to a small guestroom and she waited on the outside. After a while Elrond did exit the room and he was holding his phone. “She needs to be taken to a hospital, as of right now! She has got eclampsia and a bad case of inflamed kidneys too, she is a mess poor child”   
Jean swallowed. “Is it really possible that she was raped?”   
Elrond nodded. “She confessed everything to me, the father is a member of her mother’s congregation, a forty one year old father of five! She was not even fifteen when it happened. I am hauling these people to court, that is illegal sexual contact with a minor goddamn it”   
He punched a button and they heard a voice at the other end. “Yes?”   
Elronds voice was pressed. “It is me, listen, we have a patient coming in soon, in critical condition. Fifteen years of age, eight months pregnant and with severe eclampsia.”   
The voice answered. “Roger that, we will be ready”   
Elrond turned to Jean. “The mother is a conversion therapist, and from what I could understand Lilly isn’t the only kid she treats like this. Could you call your son in law and tell him of this? The mother is Rachel Whitley, and Lilly has been on the run for more than a week but her mother haven’t done anything to find the girl”   
Jean almost sneered. “I will call them right now, just save her please? She is a sweet kid”   
Elrond nodded and Lilly exited the room, she had been crying but Jean bent over and hugged her. “Listen, you go with doctor Elrond and he will fix you and make sure that you and the baby are alright, afterwards you can come back here, is that a deal?”   
Lilly just nodded and Elrond took her hand and lead her outside, before long he took off and he had an extra light on his car which he turned on, telling everybody that this was an emergency vehicle. Bain did look nervous. “Is she gonna die? What is wrong with her?”   
Jean sighed. “It is very serious but Elrond will fix it, I am sure he will. Her body is…it is sort of being poisoned by the baby, the blood pressure gets way too high and the systems sort of shut down, but it can be stopped.”   
Bain swallowed hard. “Oh, it sounds terrible, she is just a kid, like us”   
Jean sighed and embraced both boys, “Yes, and this should never have happened to her but you two are heroes for bringing her over, if she had stayed in the barn she could have died for sure.”   
Bain did blush and Legolas giggled, Jean picked up her cell phone and dialled Bard’s number, she was feeling rather agitated and pissed off, hoped that she would be able to stay calm while explaining the situation for the two investigators. 

Bard and Thran had discovered that the room which filled the other half of the loft was filled with kids too, girls all of them. The situation wasn’t much better for these poor little ones and the children were terrified and confused too. Bard was in shock, how could anyone do something like this? What parents sent their children off like this? He had seen the propaganda video’s Mr Wormsley had played in, but this woman had to have used even more resources than just videos. There were twelve children there in all and most were shivering with cold and trembling with fear. Bard had called everyone, even the social workers which were working in this precinct and after just twenty minutes the first ambulance pulled up in front of the house. They had to divert the traffic of people away from the murder scene and Thran found a pair of strong pliers and managed to remove the chains from most of the kids. They were from four to sixteen years old and many did look as if they had been beaten. One kid of perhaps eight years of age was crying the whole time and writhing on the bed, he was in obvious pain. There was a sheet of paper hanging at the end of each bed, with some information and Thran took the paper and read it and he went pale. The boy was wailing and Thran did lift the thin white nightshirt all of the kids were wearing. The boy was wearing some sort of barbaric contraption around his genitals, in fact it was a sort of metal container which housed both the scrotum and penis and it was strapped on tightly. Bard read the paper too, the kid had been sent there by his parents for they had seen him touching himself. Bard felt faint. “I thought this sort of thing was a thing of the very distant past”   
Thran nodded. “Me too, no wonder he is in agony.”   
Bard shuddered, with that metal thing on even the slightest swelling had to hurt like hell and the boy was feverish and barely able to speak at all. There was a hole in the contraption but it was unlikely that the poor lad had been able to urinate at all with that thing on. The police officers did lead the ambulance people through the hall and made sure that nobody did disturb the dead body and now there were people running everywhere, bringing down kids and searching through the house. One of the social workers was an elderly woman with a stern face and a terrifying temper but Bard knew her and she was a very kind soul, she just didn’t budge when some kid’s wellbeing was in jeopardy. Morwen Black had worked for the child protective services for years and she stopped and stared at Bard, her eyes were dark and her chin thrust forwards, she did look like an angry bulldog. “This…I have never…Too bad that bitch is dead for I do so much wish I could have rammed my boot up her arse.”  
Bard nodded. “Indeed”  
Another of the social service workers came running. “Folks, come here, you have got to see this”   
They followed and entered a small office, it was filled with papers and a couple of computers and the woman did punch on the keyboard and the screens came to life. “See? She was having her own web page, and she was sending adds to all sorts of churches and societies she believed would fall for her message”   
They saw a video of Mrs Whitley and she was bragging a lot, and using a lot of quotes from the bible. After the video there was a price list and Thran did whistle. “Damn it, no wonder she was loaded! Just look at that! How can anyone afford such treatment unless they are fucking rich?”   
The young social worker did lift a folder. “Here we have the “treatment regime” of each kid, it is like reading a horror novel, just way worse. “   
Thran sighed “ We saw the poor lad with the…metal contraption on his genitals, was the woman insane?”   
The woman nodded and Morwen was moaning, she was skimming over the papers and her face got more and more pale. “That thing was used on boys which had been caught masturbating, for girls the bitch used carbolic acid, on their clitoris”   
Thran swallowed hard. “This was torture, sheer torture”   
Morwen frowned. “The late Mrs Whitley did have a daughter? We do not have her registered at any schools”   
Bard nodded. “She claimed that the girl was with her mother”   
Morwen did frown even harder. “Mrs Whitley’s own mother died two years ago, and she was completely senile at the end. “   
Thran moaned. “Right, then we have to look for a missing teenager as well”   
Bard stared at Morwen and the other woman, they were gathering the papers in huge bags, everything had to be investigated for if the parents had known that their kids were going to be treated thus they would lose custody of the child. Bard was considering going over to help the CSI Technicians when his phone rang. He saw that it was Jean’s number and felt nervous right away, she would never call him at work unless something was very wrong and he answered with his voice trembling slightly. His jaw dropped in disbelief as Jean told them of the incidents back home, Thran heard too and Morwen did swear. “Oh goddamn it, if there is a hell, I hope the bitch is frying right now!”  
Bard swallowed. “Jean, do tell Bain and Legolas that they were heroes, and keep us updated. And…don’t tell Lilly that her mother is dead just yet, alright? It may upset her”  
Jean agreed and hung up and Bard had to close his eyes. “Having your own daughter raped, to prevent her from becoming a lesbian? If there ever was something which completely lacks any form of logic….”   
Morwen sighed. “These files are terrible reading, judging from the number of folders she has had at least eighty “patients” here. I cannot comprehend why she wasn’t exposed earlier”   
The young woman shook her head. “Oh I know why, the kids would be way too terrified to reveal anything at all. But I bet that she has left a trail of broken souls”   
One of the technicians did manage to catch their attention. “We do have determined where the murderer entered the building, there is a small door in the kitchen, and the lock was picked, very expertly. There were fingerprints on the door knob, we are checking them as we speak”   
The technician then returned to his work and Bard hoped that the finger prints were in the system somewhere.   
Thran frowned and tilted his head. “Mrs Black, tell me, Mrs Whitley was married yes? Her husband…? “   
Morwen made a vague gesture. “Couldn’t have done this, he is in jail. I checked the family the moment the call came now and he is behind bars for grand theft auto, breaking an entry, physical assault and for having shot at a police officer. He won’t be out in another twenty years.”   
Bard tried to think. “So, it isn’t the husband then. But then who?”   
Morwen slammed the huge pile of folders down onto a table, her eyes were blazing. “Know what? Check these files, I bet you find the murderer in here.”   
Thran did look puzzled. “What makes you say that?”   
Morwen raised her chin, defiantly. “Because I see families every day Mr Oropherson, I see them at their best and their worst and believe me, there is no thing on earth more dangerous than a parent who is trying to defend their child, or avenge it”   
Thran stared at Bard, his eyes were large. “That is it Bard, I am bloody sure. I bet that Mrs Whitley has damaged some kid so bad one of the parents snapped”   
Bard nodded. “Yes, you may be right. “   
Morwen smiled, but her eyes were dark still. “You check out the names, I will have a hell of a job now, calling parents and determining whether or not they are fit to be parents at all. And more so, finding temporary homes for more than a dozen traumatized kids”   
Bard scoffed. “You don’t need to check the parents, the kids being here in the first place is evidence enough the way I see it. Sending your kid off because he or she has been playing with themselves? Or because you suspect that he or she may be gay? “   
Morwen sighed. “I know Bard, and believe me, I agree, but there is this little thing called a court and such cases do usually end up in one. There is gonna be some serious shit flying soon, believe me. They will need a freaking jet engine and a trailer full of shit to outdo it”   
Bard took the pile of folders, it was heavy and there had to be at least fifty names in there. Thran cocked his head. “Know what? We split the heap, I will take one half and I saw a nice couch on the patio, we can read there”   
Bard sighed deeply, but he followed Thran and they did sit down. It was not the kind of reading he preferred, in fact it made the hairs stand up on his back. What sort of attitude did these people have? What beliefs and not the least, what sort of knowledge? He was disgusted by everything he read and Thran was swearing constantly, trying to stay calm. “I cannot believe this. “for not saying grace at breakfast, five lashes with the whip” She did beat the kids, she must have been very sick”   
Bard growled. “More like evil, truly evil!”  
They kept reading and put aside folders which could indicate that the kid in question had gotten into trouble later on, after an hour they sat there with five folders and Bard stared at them. “So, which one do you think is the most likely candidate?”   
Thran shrugged. “I don’t know, they are pretty terrible. But wait a minute, I have an idea”   
He pulled out his phone and opened google, then he typed in the first name. Nothing happened, then he tried the second one and after five minutes they had two names which had come up with more information. One suicide and one case of death as a result of assault. Thran stared at the names, “Right, we have Benjamin Cooper, age fifteen, died two years ago. He hung himself. Then we have Dorothy Nielsen, age thirteen, was attacked by some kids and died as a result of having fallen off a roof”   
Thran looked at Bard. “So, your gut instinct says?”   
Bard took a deep breath. “The boy, let us check him out”   
Thran smiled and started typing again and then he showed Bard the result. “He was sent to Mrs Whitley by his mom, who lives on her own some miles north of the city borders. She is divorced and has been since the kid was five.”   
Bard got up. “We may be wrong, but let us speak to this Mrs Cooper, at least we may learn something. “   
Thran shuddered. “Yes, like what makes a mother send her child off to a bloody kz camp!”

Jean had been worried for quite a while and she jumped when the phone rang, it was Elrond’s number and she grasped the phone with trembling hands. “Yes?”  
Elrond’s voice was calm and confident at the other end. “It is me, I have good news. We have managed to stabilize her, but she is probably going to give birth early, we are trying to get as much nutrition into her as possible.”   
Jean released a gasp of relief. “Oh that is wonderful, but Elrond, I have some news. I spoke to Bard, it is bizarre but…they are working on a case which involved Lilly’s mother and …Mrs Whitley has been murdered”   
There was an odd sound coming from the phone, it did sound a bit as if Elrond was choking, then she heard a row of cusswords worthy of a sailor. “Oh that is terrible, too bad. I so longed to drag her ass to court, well, we have the name of the child’s father so someone is gonna be laid on the chopping block, I won’t let this be forgotten”   
Jean had to smile. “Good, you will probably be contacted by the social services, they will need your testimony too I bet.”   
Elrond sounded as if he was growling. “Oh and they are gonna get it, I am not gonna hold back, the poor girl has been abused in every way imaginable. She will need a long recovery before she is normal again”   
Jean hesitated. “Uh, what about her baby? Can she keep it? Would that be safe at all?”   
Elrond didn’t hesitate. “She has to keep it, taking it from her will be a disaster. With the baby there she will have someone else to think about, something which will take her thoughts away from everything which have happened to her. The baby will keep her stabile”   
Jean sighed. “Then make sure that you are very clear about that.”   
He could be heard chuckling. “Don’t worry, I will make it very clear that taking the baby may cause her to become suicidal. She will have plenty of help, I don’t worry about her baby at all”   
Jean did hang up after having said goodbye, she felt slightly relaxed but nervous still. Bard had sounded as if he was very upset and she knew that it took something very bad to rock his calm personality. She just hoped that they would be able to solve this mystery as fast as possible, she wanted both of them back home for she was sure that there would be plenty of questions coming from Sigrid and Tilda and the boys too would need some more information in order to calm down. 

Thran and Bard did call Thor to report the latest development, then they headed out of the city and found the address of Mrs Cooper. The house was dark and there was no car there, the lawn hadn’t been mowed and there was trash gathering in front of the garage. Bard grimaced. “Doesn’t look as if she is at home?”   
Thran shrugged. “Nope, the house looks almost abandoned. “   
They turned around and were about to head back to the car when an elderly man wearing a pair of very baggy pants and a worn shirt with tobacco stains hailed them. “Are you looking for Mrs Cooper?”   
Thran did nod. “We are, we are from the police.”   
The old man nodded. “Doesn’t surprise me, she is not here you see, she went bonkers last May and was placed at St Catherine’s. “   
Bard had to think for a second, then he remembered that it was a hospital for mental illnesses. “ Oh, what happened?”   
The old man shrugged. “You know, she wasn’t right in the head to begin with and when her kid offed himself she lost it. I mean, we all know what she did to him, sending him off to one of those goddamn leeches who preach about the bible and God but think about their own wallet first and foremost”   
Thran frowned. “So you know of that?”   
The old man nodded. “She was bragging about it you see, claiming that this woman would cleanse her son of the “evil” which had possessed him. She was convinced that he was gay and I don’t know what was done to him but when he returned he was broken, and I did fight in the war and saw shell shocked men by the hundreds. That lad was way worse off.”   
Thran cringed and Bard felt slightly sick. “But, you say she was admitted to that hospital, what happened to her?”   
The old man scratched his thin beard. “She went berserk, at the local Wallmart. She attacked a couple with a small kid and claimed that they were breeding demons for having had a kid outside of wedlock and then she tried to tear the jacket off a small boy since it was pink. And she did try to hit a couple of guys with a tent pole, thinking they were a gay couple, which they weren’t. They were marines enjoying a day off and they subdued her rather quickly and she won’t get out of there for at least a few years. Absolutely psychotic.”   
Thran raised both eyebrows. “Oh my god, yes, that is psychotic behaviour at its worse”   
Bard tilted his head. “She is divorced, what about her ex?”   
The old man smiled. “Ah, Jared, he was a good man, way too good for her. She wasn’t like this to begin with you see, she was normal and they were a happy couple but then she started getting these religious ramblings.”   
Thran was curious. “Do you know what caused it?”   
The old man nodded. “She lost a pregnancy, and believed that she had done something wrong and needed punishment and so it began, the whole fucking mess”   
Bard sighed. “I see, you shouldn’t happen to know where the husband is?”   
The old man sighed. “He was in the army for years, the last thing I heard was that he was stationed somewhere abroad, was it Afghanistan? He tried to keep in contact with Benjamin but she shut him out completely. He wasn’t even welcome in his son’s funeral, that woman is rather stone hard ha?”   
Thran turned to Bard. “If he is in the army they have his fingerprints on record, they should be able to check them against the ones they found in Mrs Whitley’s house!”   
Bard nodded . “I am on it.”   
He did text the technicians and after just four minutes he got an answer, they matched, they had entered the army data base to find the prints. Thran swallowed. “So, Jared Cooper is the one who killed Mrs Whitley, did he kill Mr Wormsley too?”   
Bard took a deep breath and shrugged. “We need to find out, we need to find him first though”   
The old man was almost tap dancing in one place, he was very eager. “Check the pub by pier eleven. That was the place Jared used to go to when he was upset.”   
Bard did smile and shook the old man’s hand. “Thank you sir, you have been very helpful”   
Thran did look a bit nervous. “Are we going there right now? Just like that?”   
Bard nodded. “We enter as normal civilians, no badges or guns. If Jared had wanted to kill us he could have done it when we were at Mrs Whitley’s house, he had to have entered while we were talking to her.”   
Thran nodded slowly. “I agree, but why now? There is something odd about this whole thing”  
Bard smiled and took his hand. “Yes, that is true but I don’t think this man is a danger to anyone anymore, I think he got the ones he wanted”   
Thran sighed. “Let us hope so”   
The pier was by the river and it was transformed into an area of rather hip shops and the pub was in a back alley. It was a very brown pub and not very large. Bard and Thran did enter slowly, Bard had his gun ready under his coat and Thran walked behind him. There was just one man sitting by the worn bar, and Bard swallowed hard. Now they knew why Jared Cooper had acted now, this was a dying person. The man was rather tall but extremely skinny and his skin was grey and sagging. He had no hair left and the face was oddly scarred and the eyes laid deep in their sockets and he did look like a ghost. A hat laid in the chair beside him and he saw them and nodded. “It didn’t take you long”   
Bard walked over, slowly, never taking his eyes off the man. “Why? “   
Jared Cooper laid both hands on the bar, they were skin and bones but they could see that he once had been a strong and handsome man, a real fighter. “Do you have kids?”  
Bard nodded. “Yes”   
Jared tilted his head, it looked as if the small movement would be enough to break his neck. “Then you know what it is to love someone more than yourself, more than anything. Benjamin was my life, and she did all she could to keep him away from me. I didn’t fight her, not really, for I was afraid that she would hurt Ben if I insisted.”   
Thran was calm but his eyes were blazing. “And then she did hurt him, a lot”   
Jared nodded. “Yes, crazy bitch! I wouldn’t have minded at all that Ben was gay, heck, he could have been bi or trans or whatever, I would have accepted it for he was my son goddamn it. But she…she…”   
He hid his face in his hands. “She sent him to that goddamn hypocrite, to transform him! And he came back completely ruined, the lad was afraid of his own shadow, and so filled with shame. I was in Afghanistan when it happened and there was nothing I could do. I wasn’t told about his death until someone saw the news and called my captain. I didn’t even get to say goodbye”   
Bard swallowed. “That…is terrible”   
Jared sighed and stared at the glass on the desk in front of him. “So, I wanted to avenge him, by removing that filth from this earth, she has ruined so many lives, I didn’t want her to continue to destroy more children.”   
Thran cleared his voice. “ And Mr Wormsley?”   
Jared made a grimace. “Oh, him! I hated that guy. Not because he was gay but because he participated in it! Willingly! He let that bitch use his face and his voice to earn money from idiotic parents who swallowed every word he said whole. My wife had seen one of those video’s. Seen how he sat there, pretending to be an ex gay who had been turned away from the “darkness” by the loving counselling of Mrs Whitley. She saw how he claimed to have been cured, to have been cleansed, and she believed him when he claimed that everyone can be cured, of something which isn’t even a disease to begin with!”   
He sobbed and Bard felt insecure for the first time. “You killed him in a very vicious manner? And threatened him too? ”   
Jared almost sneered. “Yes, because he deserved it. I shot Mrs Whitley for she was just insane, she couldn’t help that she was evil. But that goddamn coward, I wanted him to suffer, like my son suffered, like so many other innocent kids suffered. Did you know that she would use a huge butt plug on the boys they suspected were gay and cause them so much agony the mere thought of having something stuck up back there would freak them out completely afterwards? I thought it was sweet justice to make him hurt the same way. Yes I did send him some threats, just to make him squirm, soften him up for the final blow.”   
Thran cringed, the man’s voice was very flat, emotionless. He was a damaged human being. Bard sighed. “You must have planned it well!”   
Jared nodded. “For a couple of months, I started when this … started”   
He pointed at his bald head. Bard had to blink, it did hurt looking at the man, he was such a mess. “What is it?”   
Jared sort of shrugged. “A very aggressive form of cancer, eats me alive. They think it was caused by some of all the shit we were exposed to over there, but the doctors don’t know for sure. I have less than a month left.”  
Thran stared at the man with some respect. “So you wanted to seek justice for your son before the end, that doesn’t make it right, at least not in the eyes of most”   
Jared sighed. “I know, I have killed but my conscience is clean, I did remove some vermin from this world. Well, Mr Wormsley was perhaps not vermin but he was a culprit, if he hadn’t let that cunt use his talents as an actor fewer would have become convinced of her skills, and fewer kids would have suffered. My only regret is that I waited this long”   
Bard took a deep breath. “Mr Cooper, you are under arrest for the murder of Mrs Whitley and Mr Wormsley”   
He nodded. “I know, just let me finish my drink. It will be my last one for sure!”   
Bard shrugged and the man tossed the content of the glass back. “Salute, here’s to death”   
Jared got up from the chair, stood there like a trembling sack of skin and bones and then he collapsed onto the floor. Thran grasped onto him and the man trembled a few times and moaned and then he stopped breathing. The body convulsed twice and became still and Bard stared at the corpse with disbelief. He grasped the glass and sniffed it. “Bitter almonds, it was cyanide”   
Thran did look at the dead man with some sadness. “He died like a soldier after all, on his feet, with his boots on”   
Bard called it inn, then he sat down and felt odd. It was strange but he did pity Mr Cooper and he did understand why the man had done this. The only thing he couldn’t quite understand was the level of brutality Jared had used against Mr Wormsley but Jared had been a soldier in a very brutal war. He had most likely been just as injured as his son, just on a different level. Bard and Thran sat by the body until the coroner came to take it away, neither of them said much. 

It did take quite a lot of talk to explain all of this to the kids and Bard spent many days interrogating parents. Most didn’t know that Mrs Whitley did torture the children but some did and were convinced that it was the right thing to do. Morwen did take care of those kids immediately and the case got a lot of publicity. There were several lawsuits made against the late Mrs Whitley and so her money went to pay for the damages she had caused. It was a very nerve wrecking process and Bard and Thran were exhausted when it was all over with.   
Lilly gave birth to a girl two weeks later, she was a very brave one and did act in a very mature manner. The midwife was impressed. Elrond had arranged for Lilly to stay with a couple he knew and Lilly did visit Jean quite often and became like an adopted granddaughter. She did reveal that she was going to study to become a mid-wife and everybody did support her. After a few months she did look normal again and she was thawing and learning a lot, she and Sigrid became good friends and she was told by both Bard and Thran that she was always welcome there, and that they would help her as much as they could. She didn’t go to her mother’s funeral, in fact the reverend and the grave digger was the only one who were present so it was a very lonely goodbye to this world.   
Elrond did drag the father of Lilly’s baby to court, and the whole thing became a rather toxic mess for it turned out that Mrs Whitley had used the same method on some other girls, believing that being fucked by a man would prevent them from wanting to be with a woman. The man did confess after a while, Elrond had suggested that he was sent to a prison infamous for the short life expectancy of rapists, child abusers and such. He was sent off to some other prison instead for having confessed and he would stay there for the rest of his life and then some. The rest of Mrs Whitley’s congregation was also investigated and quite a lot of filth was revealed. The whole case did take four whole months to investigate and the newspaper were revelling in the juicy details. It was not very likely that they would be able to assemble again and their attitudes were publicly condemned by the mayor himself. 

Thran did not forget the case though, one Sunday the tall blonde did pull up next to a local church and wandered inside. He did look very angelic that day with the long blonde hair loose and he strolled up the aisle as if he had every right to be there. The fat sweaty preacher was staring at him, the tall stranger had interrupted him right in the middle of the best part of his speech. Thran smiled to the congregation and raised his arms. “Your preacher claims that he can cure the sick, and that he can perform miracles.”   
Thran turned around and walked over to a small bent man with a wide hat and a leg which appeared to be crippled. He was using two crutches and he did look a bit grey. “So, what do you say mister? Are you ready to be healed?”   
He leaned down and whispered. “You see, I am from the police, and I give you five seconds to leave this church before you go down for participating in a fraud”  
The man jumped up, the crutches flied in opposite directions and the man sprinted down the aisle like a top athlete down a track. Everybody gaped and Thran tilted his head. “See? Everybody can make miracles, even a worn out old cop like me. You wouldn’t believe he was paralyzed the way he ran ha?”   
Thran pulled a pair of handcuffs out of his pocket and his grin became wolfish. “And now Mr Preacher, do you have any more miracles stuffed up your sleeve? For you are gonna need them mister, in special when the judge sees the nice video’s you have posted, and the tax authorities? Oh my, they are gonna love your real accounting, you are going down you see, deep deep down where your profit preaching cannot help you at all”   
The preacher did moan, then he did try to run but tripped in his microphone wire and landed on his belly, for a moment he did look like a stranded whale. Thran did put the cuffs on him and Bard entered with the rest of the officers on the case. “Well done partner”   
Thran did brush the dust off his hands. “I have wanted to do that for weeks!”  
Bard just grinned as the other cops did haul the preacher away. Thran had been fuming for days and this was just what he had needed, a little hands on action. Boromir had told them that the preacher had a new man working for him and at least one more menace was off the streets, people wouldn’t lose their money to this leech and no more kids would suffer at the hands of Mrs Whitley, and thus there was justice in the world after all.


	5. The music of the night...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bard and Thran are called to a most unusual murder scene and soon they are facing a real mystery...

Chapter 5: The music of the night…

The club was packed, there wasn’t any room left whatsoever and the guard at the door had already had to ask several people to go somewhere else, they couldn’t fit anyone else into this place. They were already breaking every safety regulation there was and the manager was sweating. If something did go wrong tonight his ass was on the line for sure. Club Boom was relatively new and not that well known, it was located in an area of the city not exactly well known for high end clubs and they wanted to change that. Boom was supposed to be a club where everyone was welcome and they wanted to combine concerts and performances with nice surroundings and an accepting atmosphere. That was why the band they had hired for this night was one of the lesser known ones, they called themselves Stonewashed black and played a rather aggressive form of metal. The manager had his doubts but the music was popular and even if I it didn’t have a huge crowd those who did come to the concerts were die hard fans of the genre. He had never seen that much black leather and spikes before, the room did look a lot like a black hole now, black clothes, black make up, black everything. 

But the money was rushing inn and the manager could only hope that later gigs would bring just as large a crowd, this would most certainly put their name on the map and if that meant having to deal with people who saw black as the most attractive colour that was then be it. Some of the women out there wore what he could only guess was liquid paper smeared all over their faces and the clothing? He had visited a few fetish shops in his days but this? Man o man, it was the wet dream of anyone attracted to black leather, that was for sure. The band was good, they were a rising star among the countless amateur bands and the singer did have talent. He was well known for having an insane vocal range and right now he was head banging while the lead guitar player were showing off his skills with a very vigorous riff. Like it or not, this music did have a very powerful rhythm. 

The lead singer’s name was Billy Jasper and he was studying to become an architect of all things but today he was pushing that part of his life aside and on stage he was better known as Raw, he had gotten that nickname due to his voice. The stage wasn’t large but it was a good one for such gigs and they had decorated it according to their image. A blow up doll had been placed on an upside down cross at the back of the stage between the drummer and the keyboardist and some old fashioned wicker baskets had been placed along the edge of the stage to hide the crates which contained the pyro effects which would be used in their final act. Someone had sprayed the baskets with fake blood and someone had even managed to get some cardboard heads from a local theatre, they didn’t look very realistic but that wasn’t the point, in the dim light they were realistic enough. 

Raw was growling his way through the lyrics of one of their most popular songs, the atmosphere within the club was electric and he was having the time of his life. The crowd was singing along and he was giving it his all, this was what life was all about, the sheer joy of knowing that they all were watching him and sharing this experience. He put his foot up on one of the boxes, the lyrics entered a part where he was supposed to really let loose and howl and he was preparing for it. Being a metal vocalist did in fact require a lot of training, if you weren’t prepared you would ruin your vocal cords in no time and some of the best had just as intensive a training behind them as any opera singer. There were several baskets placed around this box and one of them tipped over, a severed head did roll out of it and stopped against the box with the pyro effects. Raw didn’t look at it at first for it was just a prop but as he started on his roar he did look down just once as he took inn enough air to finish the roar and his eyes did widen. 

At first he thought “this is a sick joke” but then he realized that this was no joke and the head was real. Worst of all, he knew who it was and the roar became a scream which would have made the take off roar of a jet fighter seem pathetic. The crowd went wild, this was beyond anything they could have anticipated, the speakers were moaning and the rest of the band threw surprised glances at each other, what the fuck? Was Raw trying to ruin his voice? The crowd couldn’t see the head which was staring up at Raw with empty eyes and the vocalist did stagger backwards and stumbled. There were wires all over the stage and his foot got tangled in one and he fell backwards and disappeared from view like he was some magician and not a singer.  
The crowd was screaming as one, this was amazing, the best concert ever!   
Raw managed to get to his feet, then he dropped the mike and puked all over the tall spiked leather boots the lead guitarist was wearing, the guitar player just gaped in shock and then he saw what the vocalist had seen and if the singer had produced a sound nobody could believe that a human throat was capable of making his guitar did now conjure up a sound which made several of the speakers say a cruel goodbye to this fair world and several of the concert goers did hear naught but ringing for days afterwards. The keyboardist saw the head as well and screamed and the drummer looked like a question mark until someone pointed at the head and then he tried to stand up a bit too fast with the result that he managed to tip the entire drum set. The sound was interesting, but not very nice, nor very rhythmic. The crowd cheered, this band did really go all the way, they had never seen anything like this, not since someone had started throwing pieces of pigs carcasses over the crowd at some concert years ago.

It took more than an hour to calm the crowd down and when the managed finally got an explanation he called the cops but not before he had discretely managed to get half of the crowd out of the back door. A dead guy was bad, getting fined for having overfilled the club was worse. Secretly he was rubbing his hands in glee, a club where some metal dude had been murdered, oh that would draw a crowd, most certainly. Sex and death, those were the big sellers and he just hoped that they wouldn’t have to stay closed for too long.   
\-----  
Bard and Thran had been finishing the paper work on a rather straight forward case of vehicular manslaughter when Thor called them, they were the only ones available and Bard had really looked forward to a quiet night but no such thing was to be had now. They arrived at the club with a few other officers and a hearse and of course Judith. She was looking eager and Bard couldn’t understand how she could do her job without going bonkers. They had to wait for a few moments before the police officers managed to get the concert goers out of the way, they didn’t want people to leave until they had questioned them. Bard stared at Judith. “You look excited?” 

Judith nodded. “Oh yes, a decapitation. Those are rare, and it can tell us a lot about this murder” 

Bard frowned. “Really?” 

She nodded. “Just you wait and see, you cannot just cut someone’s head off without revealing a lot about yourself” 

They were let inn and the officers showed them the way to the stage. It had been cleared but the head and the baskets were still there and Thran was staring at the decorations with a narrow smile. “I don’t think they anticipated a real head, I hear the singer lost it?” 

The officer in charge of the scene nodded. “Yep, the bloke and the band are in the wardrobe as we speak, he puked his guts out and the rest of them are rather pale, and I don’t mean their make up!”

Judith was bending down, the head lay next to a box with a danger sign on it and she examined the wicker basket it had been hidden within. She frowned. “See? No blood here, except the fake one. The head was placed here well before the concert” 

Bard turned towards the man who was responsible for the stage, it was a young fellow with shoulder long blond hair and teeth which made him look a bit like a beaver. “Who had access to the stage before the concert?” 

The guy grimaced. “Uh everybody? We rigged the stage early this morning for we were busy later in the day and everything just stood here for like, twelve hours?” 

Thran sighed. “And during that time, did anyone who doesn’t belong here enter the building?” 

The guy shrugged. “The hell if I know? The doors were open. Listen, before a gig like this there are people running to and fro all the time, we have people preparing the wardrobes, some who are refilling the bar, some caterers, the band’s families, fans who try to get an autograph and …you see? “ 

Thran nodded. “I get it kid, but did any of you who work here see anything out of the ordinary?” 

The young man tossed his head, pointing at the crowd. “With people like these, define “out of the ordinary” please. If someone walked in here wearing a suit and tie that would be out of the ordinary for sure but nope, nothing was different enough for us to notice” 

Bard stared at Judith, she was examining the head and she grinned. “He was decapitated well before he was placed here, I do believe he has been dead for at least twenty four hours” 

Thran turned and stared at her. “Based on what?” 

She pointed at the eyes. “The viscosity of the liquid within the eyes, but look here” 

She turned the head so the bloody neck came into view, Bard felt that his dinner wanted to return to daylight and forced himself to swallow, hard! “See? This was done by someone who was determined or desperate, it takes a lot of power to cut through a neck and this person was brutal and yet not completely without skills” 

Thran turned around, slightly green and the officer who stood next to them was walking away, making some odd gulping sounds. “What do you mean?” 

She sort of slid a gloved finger along the cut skin. “When people think of decapitation they usually think about things like swords, and axes or even one of those barbaric contraptions from the French revolution, it all leaves a clean cut and it cuts the bone as well as tissue. That cannot be achieved with anything like a kitchen knife for sure” 

She turned the head slightly again. “See? The person has had to move the cut a bit upwards to find a weak spot between the vertebrae to sever it. He didn’t use a power tool for sure, but a rather sharp knife, I bet it was a meat knife but the initial cut was made by something rather broad” 

Bard frowned, the thing had already started to smell and he felt like retching, again! “Like what?” 

Judith shrugged. “I have no idea, it could be a meat cleaver? An axe? I need the rest of the body to be sure, and of course the scene of the murder. “ 

Bard nodded. “Right, we have to find the rest of this dude, the band knows who he is?” 

The officer who stood at the edge of the stage nodded, he didn’t turn around to look at them, Bard could see that he was struggling to keep his cools. “Yes, they are waiting for you guys” 

Bard took a deep breath, a black metal band, this could get interesting for sure. The wardrobe wasn’t far from the stage and it was packed, the band consisted of seven members and then there were some roadies and a make up girl who sat on a table at the back of the room looking shell shocked. Everybody look up as they entered and Bard did blink when he realized that a couple of the guys in fact had been crying, either that or that make up they were wearing had been wreaking havoc on their eyes. “I am Bard Bowman, I am the investigator in charge of this case, now, I am told that you know who the victim is?” 

The singer nodded, he blew his nose into a handkerchief and was red-eyed and shivering. “Yes, it is Nidhogr” 

Thran frowned. “A what?” 

The man swallowed. “Sorry, that is his stage name, his real name is Wayne J Dale, he used to the lead singer of another band, Infernal Combustion.” 

Thran looked as if he was fascinated. “That stage name, I think I have heard it before?” 

The vocalist tried to smile. “It is from the Norse mythology, it is the dragon which gnaws at the roots of the world tree, Yggdrasil. He thought that was cool you see. His band was mythology based, they were very good too” 

Thran nodded slowly. “Alright, so he is Wayne J Dale and what else can you tell us?” 

The guitar player choked a sob. “I cannot believe that he is dead, man, he was the nicest guy ever! He let me borrow his guitar when mine had to be repaired and …we did love him, we did all love him” 

Bard stared at Thran and the lead singer sighed. “Listen, everybody thinks that we who play this sort of music are a bunch of arseholes right? That we run around murdering each other but that is so unfair. We are a small community and everybody knows each other, the music binds us together man, like nothing else.” 

The make up girl nodded. “Listen, they speak the truth. I do the make up for a lot of commercial bands too and if you want complete assholes go check them out. Arrogant empty headed bastards most of them. These guys on the other hand? I have never had any problems with them at all, they are all so very nice. Nidhogr was the kindest man you can imagine. He could scare the shite out of the devil himself while on stage but otherwise? He is the kind of a guy who would sacrifice himself to save a puppy!”

Bard sort of sighed. “So, he was a good guy, we get it, but he is dead nonetheless. Do you know anyone who would want to harm him?” 

They all looked at each other, faces rather blank. “No, I don’t think he had any enemies at all, I mean, who would want to harm a man like that?” 

The drummer was wearing a sweat drenched t shirt and he shivered, he had to be rather cold for the room was chilly. Thran stared at him. “So nobody has any idea of anyone who has a grudge against this guy?” 

The make up girl shrugged. “He does have an ex wife but they parted on friendly terms, no hard feelings there at all. She could perhaps tell you more?” 

Bard smiled. “That would be great, yes,. What is her name?” 

The make up girl frowned. “Samantha Larkinson, she lives in Freeway drive 89 C. I was there a few times to help compose their looks for a gig” 

Thran squinted. “Their looks?” 

She nodded. “Yes, Sam was also a member of Infernal Combustion for a while, she played a Bodhran. But she quit after a while, she had two jobs and didn’t have the time.” 

The vocalist blew his nose again. “Wayne lives in an apartment now, I think the address is Chesterstreet 74 E. It is a small place but he doesn’t need more, at least that is what he says. “ 

Bard nodded. “Did he have a job of some sorts, besides the metal I mean?” 

The singer sort of frowned. “Well, metal isn’t a job man, it is a lifestyle, a sort of statement, a state of mind, but yes, he did have a job. He did work at the local animal shelter, it is a non kill shelter so they try to rehome every animal they get.” 

Bard stared at Thran. “The head was placed here, deliberately. Why?” 

Thran shrugged. “I have no idea? To throw us off the tracks?” 

The keyboardist did raise a hand, like a kid at school. “Excuse me? I think I know why, everybody tends to think that we are awfully aggressive and violent and that we worship Satan or whatever. If someone finds a dead person with connection to our music genre everybody tends to think that we act like gangs and kill off those we see as enemies.” 

Thran sort of smirked. “And you don’t? “ 

The long thin guy shook his head. “No, absolutely not. We get all our aggression out on stage, we don’t bottle it up inside like all others. It is cathartic to just rid yourself of all negativity on stage, we can say whatever we want to for we are expected to. Even when two bands are portrayed as being bitter enemies that’s usually just to create some extra attention. We stand together man, many will mourn now, and deeply” 

Bard stared at the band, they were sad, there was no doubt about that and it was an odd experience, seeing these long haired and somewhat wild looking guys sobbing like toddlers. “Right, if any of you remember anything you think is important, no matter how insignificant, do not hesitate to call us, alright?” 

Everybody nodded and Thran turned to Bard, his expression serious. “So, whoever did this knew that Mr Dale was in the metal community and knew about this concert too. “ 

Bard smiled and opened the door, the room did reek of sweat and he couldn’t get out fast enough.” Yes, we need to go to his ex and hear what she has to say.” 

He saw that Judith had bagged the head now and he gave the home address of the deceased to her and the other officers. “We will catch up with you when we have spoken to the ex, be careful” 

Judith smiled and put the head in a cooler. “Will do, I am very curious, I think the one who killed Mr Dale here was left handed though.” 

Thran tilted his head. “Oh?” 

She did look eager. “Yes, the cuts were made from the right towards the left, from behind him. It was rather odd, I have never seen cuts like that. The killer did try to get the head off as fast as possible and yet…it seems as if he has tried to be gentle too, I cannot understand it.” 

Bard dragged Thran with him to the car and they drove off, the manager was arguing with the CSI team who were to go over the stage looking for anything which could be evidence. He was afraid they would close the club. The concert goers hadn’t seen anything out of the ordinary and neither had the employees so that didn’t give them any ideas. Bard drove at a moderate speed towards the home of the ex wife of the now dead metal singer, he was thinking hard. “I still do believe that this could be some sort of music related murder” 

Thran shook his head. “I don’t, we have to have an open view here, and think widely. He was more than a metal singer, remember that” 

Bard just scoffed and kept driving, luckily the home of the ex wife wasn’t that far away. The apartment lay in a huge complex and they found it fast. It did have a nice painting on the door, of a huge tree with two ravens in it, a squirrel on the trunk and a dragon underneath it. Two wolves were painted on each side and Thran tilted his head. “This is gonna be enlightening for sure” 

They knocked on the door and after a few moments the door was opened. A petite woman with long raven black hair and a heart shaped face peeked out at them. “Yes?” 

She wore a long blue blouse, a set of worn jeans and if it hadn’t been for the Thor’s hammer she wore around her neck she could have been an ordinary housewife. “Ma’am, we are from the police, it is about your ex husband, Wayne?” 

She paled. “Oh gods, don’t tell me he has been in an accident? He drives so recklessly at times…” 

Thran swallowed. “Ma’am, I am sorry, it is…” 

She blinked, ashen grey. “He is dead isn’t he?” 

Bard tried to stay calm. “Yes Ma’am” 

The woman let out a keen, then she went limp and fell straight into the door and the two men had to pry it open to get inside. She had passed out and they carried her over to a couch by the window. Bard did notice that the apartment was very nice, and the decorations were all very old fashioned. Most very Viking inspired and he saw a row of very nice old fashioned swords and axes on one of the walls. There were some small statues on what could only be described as a house altar and he realized that this woman probably was a pagan for real. She groaned and came too and started to cry, immediately. Thran took her hand. “I am so sorry Ma’am, your ex husband was…murdered!” 

She wailed and shook her head. “That cannot be true, he was kindness incarnate! Everybody adored him, it has to be some sort of misunderstanding, are you sure it is him?” 

Thran nodded. “He was positively identified by the members of a band who knew him. “ 

She tried to get up. “I need to see him, they may be wrong!”

Bard held her back. “No, I don’t think that will be a good idea, yet. “ 

She sobbed. “Oh Wayne, this cannot be true!”

Thran took her hand. “You were divorced?” 

She nodded. “Six months ago, we didn’t end up as enemies if that is what you think, we just decided that he was needing time on his own and in my religion divorce isn’t such a big deal. He said he needed to rethink things, to sort of come to terms with life and everything. We did still meet every now and then.” 

Thran smiled. “You are pagan?” 

She smiled, there was some pride in it. “Yes, I am a priestess in fact, of the old Norse gods, Freya in special. Wayne…he was raised as a Cristian and he had some problems with removing himself completely from that idiotic indoctrination” 

Bard frowned. “And by indoctrination you mean?” 

She shrugged. “The belief that everything is here just for mankind, that we have the right to do whatever we like, that we are sort of the pinnacle of creation. In my religion humans are just a part of nature, no more important than the trees or the animals. He had a hard time finding the balance you see, he felt guilty for not being able to change the world so to speak” 

Bard nodded, “He sounds like a very sensitive person?” 

She sobbed. “Oh he was, so sweet, so caring. I cannot truly believe that he is gone!”

Thran blinked. “So you couldn’t live together without being unhappy?” 

She sort of sighed. “Well, he is the love of my life but he had to come to terms with things before I could take him back, he was so angry at the world at times, at the arrogance he saw every day. He became withdrawn and sort of silent and we decided that it was best that we stayed separated, at least for a while. Until he got his thoughts under control again.” 

Thran frowned. “Was he an activist?” 

She tilted her head. “Yes, but only through the music, he didn’t set fire to laboratories or things like that, he didn’t even demonstrate. He believed that his lyrics could make people think twice” 

Bard sauntered over to a huge bookshelf which stood by a stereo rack and he discovered that the shelf was filled with not books but old fashioned LP records and CD’s. He didn’t recognize half of the names there and the other half was unreadable. What was it with metal bands and fonts which looked like a Rorschach test? Samantha saw his interest and smiled, a very sad smile. “His collection, he has got a lot of music, also from Europe. He even has got some of the first black metal albums ever recorded” 

She got up and walked over. “See? These are very valuable these days” 

She showed some records and Thran tilted his head. “Mayhem? I think I have heard about them?” 

She sort of wiped her eyes. “I am sure you have, and then we have some other stuff he also liked” 

She pulled out some CD’s and Bard read the labels. “Wardruna, Amon Amarth? I have no clue about what this is?” 

She smiled and put the CD’s back in the shelf. “Viking music, and Viking metal, the name is from Tolkien, another name for Mt Doom.” 

Thran raised an eyebrow. “So he was into fantasy as well?” 

She had to laugh. “Listen, I can count at least two dozen bands who have their names taken directly from Tolkien and many times that which have lyrics inspired by his works. Fantasy is a higher form of art in our eyes” 

Bard had never read those sorts of books and just shrugged but Thran did look fascinated. She sort of slumped forwards again. “May I…may I ask…how did he die?” 

Bard shrunk but Thran tried to stay calm. “He was decapitated” 

Samantha gasped and her eyes got huge. “Oh by Odin’s eye, that is…” 

Bard swallowed. “Rather grizzly yes”

Samantha sort of straightened herself. “At least he died a warrior’s death then, by steel. Oh Gods, you must find the one who did this, you must! I cannot rest until you do”

Thran tried to smile. “I will promise you that we won’t rest until we find the culprit Ma’am. “ 

She stared at him. “I see, I bet you both are men who keep your promises right? Good, the one who killed my Wayne was a monster” 

Bard wetted his lips. “Do you have anyone who can stay with you? You shouldn’t be alone now” 

She nodded. “I have friends, I will call them. We will hold a wake in his honour” 

Thran tilted his head and looked a bit worried. “No family?” 

She shook her head. “No, I have cut off all contact with them. They do as so many others believe that being pagan means being a Satanist” 

Thran scoffed. “I have heard about that sort of attitude yes” 

Samantha sighed. “Yes, and it does annoy me. Satan is a Christian deity, and we are not Christians so why the heck should we bother with him? We do have Loki but he isn’t a God of evil, more like mischief and practical jokes.” 

Bard smiled. “People are ignorant” 

She pouted. “Darn right they are. I am a certified nurse and I have lost so many jobs when they find out that I am a pagan. The place I work now is alright though, they tolerate everyone as long as we do our job and I am good at what I do, so my job is safe, thank Odin” 

Bard bowed his head. “We will notify you as soon as we know more, and I have to inform you that …we haven’t found the body yet.” 

She paled again and leaned against the wall. “Sweet Freya have mercy. I will wait here, please, just let me have him back for burial when you are done with his body” 

Thran shook her hand. “That is alright, we will let you know the moment we solve this” 

Samantha did slump down into a chair again and Bard and Thran did return to the car after having given her their number and received hers. Thran shook his head. “I think this guy was a very troubled soul, but he kept it hidden”

Bard shrugged. “You are the shrink here, so I have to agree” 

Thran took a deep breath. “I think we will find the culprit rather fast. The murder wasn’t that well planned if what Judith said is true. There has to be a crime scene and I bet we will find the evidence needed there.” 

Bard started the car. “I hope you are right”   
\---------  
Wayne Dale’s apartment was not very large at all, it was more of a closet than an apartment and it was Spartan in the extreme. But the apartment did look like an abattoir right now, and Thran stopped and gaped and Bard had to retch. He had seen a lot in his days but this? It did look as if someone had tried to recreate the blood shower scene from the movie Blade in there. There was blood everywhere and in the middle Judith was gathering up what had been a fluffy white rug. Now it was a fluffy red rug. She smiled and waved a bloody hand at them. “Finally, we have found the body, it was stuffed into the garbage bin outside of the door, imagine that? Now that is sloppy work for sure” 

Bard growled. “More like desperate, and reckless. The murderer must have panicked!”

She nodded. “But the body told me a lot, it is on its way to the morgue now by the way.” 

Thran looked curious. “Like what?” 

She shrugged. “He was tortured” 

Bard gaped. “What?! Seriously?” 

Judith nodded. “Yes, his hands had been crushed, his testes too. He had deep cuts in his torso and someone had fried his feet. “ 

Thran was wide eyed. “That…is grotesque?! What was going on here?” 

Judith shrugged. “Beats me to be honest, but the place was torn apart. The one who did this was looking for something for sure” 

Bard did see that the apartment had been ransacked and that it had been done thoroughly too. Every piece of furniture turned upside down and smashed and every shelf emptied. Judith held up something, it was a double bladed axe, the Viking type. “This was what killed him, or rather, slashed his throat. The final decapitation was done with a carving knife, in great frustration and anger or so it seems” 

Thran looked at the scene. “He didn’t give the attacker what he wanted, he kept his mouth shut. That was very brave, or foolish. What could he have been hiding?” 

Bard sighed and looked down, the floor was covered with blood and he was glad he had remembered to put plastic socks over his shoes before entering. “I have no idea” 

Thran did walk through the room, eyes narrow and Bard knew he was trying to make a picture of what the room had been like before it was demolished. There was a fish tank in one corner, not very large and it was left alone for some reason. Bard walked closer, curious. The tank was one with a pump and it looked nice, he backed off when he saw the fish inside of it. “Holy shit, is that a piranha?” 

Thran walked over. “Yeah, of the most vicious sort too” 

Bard bowed down, stared at the fish. It had the same expression as a vicious bulldog he once had encountered and the same sort of under bite. The tank was clean and the water looked very fresh, it was a loved pet for sure. There was a sort of decoration on the sand, a tiny plastic castle of the type you see in a thousand fish tanks like this. Thran tilted his head. “I wonder…” 

He rolled up his sleeve and Bard gasped. “NO, are you nuts?! That is…” 

Thran reached down into the tank and grasped the castle, something was shining underneath it and he grasped a handful of sand and pulled it up. The fish kept swimming in circles, obviously upset but not aggressive. Bard let out a sigh. “Oh my goodness. It could have mauled you!”

Thran shook his head. “No, only of I had been bleeding. And they are school fish, they don’t attack while they are alone.” 

He opened his hand and among the sand was a small metal key. He lifted it carefully and read the letters on its side. “E-112-B. That has to be a sort of storage key, but what storage?”

Judith snapped her fingers. “Go through his bank account, if he has a storage room somewhere he has to pay for it right?” 

Bard nodded. “Yes, good idea.” 

Judith finished her job and took off and Bard wondered what this key was hiding. What was worth enough to justify this? He called Elisa and she promised to look into Mr Dale’s finances and Thran shook some water off his hand. “Whatever this is, Mr Dale did try to hide it. And he paid for that with his life. “ 

Bard shrugged. “Yes, I know. Makes me wonder, maybe he had some shadier sides after all?”

Thran sort of made a grimace. “We do all have a darker side my friend, but I fear that this could be very dark indeed.!”

When they left the apartment Thran checked the news and the reporters were already all over the case, the headlines were yelling about Satanist murders and cults, Bard felt a sudden urge to spew. Thran sighed. “The manager of that club will be filthy rich now, believe me. People will flock to the place, and I bet that the record sale of that band will skyrocket too” 

Bard felt how his face turned rather stiff. “Yeah, some will always make profit out of the misery of others”

Thran nodded. “Amen to that!”

Elisa called back, she sounded excited. “I found it, he made a deposit each month to Seaside Storages, it is down by the docks” 

Bard turned to his husband and felt a bit nervous. “Then shall we?” 

Thran nodded sternly and waved his hand at a couple of officers. “Yes, and you two, follow us. This could be something rather nasty” 

The two officers did look a bit nervous and looked at each other with sweaty faces.   
The drive to the dock was long and Thran reported to Thor about their findings, the chief was already being flooded by reporters who wanted him to confirm that this was some sort of Satanistic ritual murder. He had already told several to sod off. The storage business was closed but a swift phone to the owner ensured that one of the employees did arrive to unlock the front gate and let them inn. The guy was yawning and he did look as if he was dragged straight out of his bed. No wonder , it was still rather early in the morning. Bard showed a note with the number and the guy sighed and waved his hand. “That is one of the largest rooms here, we have a hundred of them and about two hundred smaller ones. The large ones are more expensive but you could fit a boat in there” 

Bard smiled politely but the guy was obviously trained to brag about the place to everybody and didn’t shut up until Thran told him to close his mouth. The storage room was at the end of a long row of large doors and Bard waited until the officers had caught up with them. The door was easy to open and they slid it up with some worry. What could this room hide?   
It was filled with crates, all very carefully placed and they were in neat rows. Each crate was rather small and some looked old and Bard looked very confused. What was this? Thran walked over and untied the string which held one of the crates closed, he opened the lid and his expression was unreadable. “Bard, you won’t believe this…”

Bard swallowed, there was something strange in Thran’s voice, was this something truly horrific? Thran reached down and hauled something out of the crate, Bard could do nothing but stare.   
It was a teddybear, a very cute fluffy teddybear and it was wrapped in silk paper and obviously taken very good care off. Bard let his breath out in a gasp. “What the actual fuck?!”

Thran nodded. “Like I would have said it myself” 

He opened another crate and revealed yet another teddy bear, it was of a different make and colour but it was very nice and pretty and rather old too. “What is this about?” 

Bard swallowed, there had to be at least a thousand crates like that in there. “Could there be drugs hidden in them?” 

Thran blinked. He looked so confused. “I have no clue, they don’t look as if they have been tampered with though” 

He pulled out his phone. “I am gonna call his ex and ask, maybe she knows something about this. “ 

He called and after a short while the two stood there staring at each other. The collection of teddy bears was something he had inherited from his mom, it had been about two hundred of them back then and the collection was worth about 200 grand. Now it had grown and he had told Samantha that he had sold it? But apparently he had kept it and even kept collecting and Thran dropped the phone and looked intrigued. “If this was what the murderer was after there has to be something very special in here” 

Bard sort of scoffed. “We need an antiquity expert, asap” 

Thran called Elisa who found a man working for the local museum who could come to assist them and Bard stared at the room. About a thousand Teddybears? And the man who owned them had been on stage with corpse make up, screaming out the lyrics? The contrast was breathtaking. Thran did google the band and showed Bard an image of the deceased while on stage, he did look horrible and terrifying and then he showed a picture of Wayne with his friends, smiling and laughing at a bar. It was hard to believe that this was the same man. The expert came after half an hour, a small thin man with a wrinkly suit and a hat. He looked eager and Bard explained the case, the man who presented himself as Joseph V Glocken immediately retrieved an ipad from his suitcase and started typing and he looked a bit shocked when he stopped. “Gentlemen, if I am not mistaken you are looking at the most valuable collection of Teddy Bears ever.” 

Thran blinked, “Ha?” 

Joseph smiled, a stiff smile. “Oh yes, it is well known among collectors, the Dale collection. Here we have teddy bears who belonged to famous stars, royalty and celebrities of every sort. That one over there with the pink Tutu is said to have belonged to Shirley Temple”

Thran wetted his lips. “So, how much is it worth then?”

Joseph tilted his head. “ Oh, hard to say, some aren’t confirmed as being authentic but even without those? I say about three mill. “ 

Thran started to cough and Bard was gaping. “Three mill? For a bunch of teddy bears?” 

Joseph nodded solemnly. “Oh yes, I do know that someone from the antiques society of this city was hired to evaluate the value of this collection a year ago. There has been rumours of it being for sale for the last two months” 

Bard stared at Thran. “I think….” 

Thran answered. “Therefor I am, no, I know what you are thinking, let us check Mr Dale’s will!”

Thran was on the phone right away and Bard was about to ask the officers to close the storage room again when Judith called, she was a bit short of breath. “Bard? Listen, I have checked the body, oh man, this changes everything, absolutely everything!”

Bard held his breath. “What does?” 

Judith was moving around judging by the sound. “Mr Dale was a dead man even before he was attacked, he had cancer, last stage. Everywhere! He wouldn’t have survived for more than perhaps two more weeks, I have never seen anything this bad”

Bard couldn’t believe his own ears. “What?” 

Judith was short of breath. “He must have refused treatment, or maybe it was discovered too late. Anyhow, he quit singing for a reason, he must have been living in hell for weeks, the agony must have been horrible. He died with enough morphine in his system to stun a Clydesdale, and a royal dosage of sleeping medicine as well. He was drugged out of his mind, and the torture wounds were inflicted post mortem. It was subtle but I am smart, I saw it when I got to take a closer look at the injuries.” 

Bard stared at Thran and his eyes were huge. “Say you have gotten something?” 

Thran shrugged. “Not yet, Elisa is about to check the local lawyers to see if he has left any sort of will there.” 

They stared at each other. “Did he have life insurance?”

It came out in unison and Bard grasped his phone again. 

After another hour it was clear that yes, he did have a huge life insurance and in case of his death his ex wife was to receive it all. And she would inherit everything he had, including the money from the collection. Bard stared at Thran. “She cannot have done this?” 

His voice was pleading and Thran shook his head. “No, I don’t think so, her reaction was genuine, she was in real shock. She didn’t know, so who did kill him?”

Thran was thinking hard, his eyes dark. “Listen, Wayne wanted to secure her future right? He must have known he was dying, and that was what made him divorce her, so she didn’t have to witness his death struggle. He was living in hell as Judith said, most men would have killed themselves but if he did….” 

Bard snapped his hands. “No insurance money! So he made someone kill him” 

Thran held his breath. “Yes, it wasn’t rage Judith saw in the injuries, it was grief! The one who killed him did not want to do it, but had to.” 

Bard nodded. “And the torture was done with him being dead already, probably right after his heart stopped to hide that it wasn’t for real. And the key hid in the fish tank on purpose, so someone would find it. “ 

Thran stared at Bard. “Then who killed him? Who would go so far to help someone?” 

Bard clenched his jaw. “Someone who is a true friend. Oh it was so well planned, even the placing of the head. The band will earn a lot of money now, and so will the club. It was the work of a genius.” 

Thran sighed. “I remember what Samantha said, by steel. He was truly a believer, this way he would die right, and not end up at that other place, Helheim or whatever they called it” 

Bard raised his head. “Their religion does have priests right? Check if there are any in this area?” 

Thran was on google and before long they had a list of names and they searched through them swiftly. Thran pointed at one of them. “This one, Alderic McCullan, He is a rather young man, not old and decrepit. “ 

Bard was tense. “Does he have an address?” 

Thran showed him and Bard nodded. “Let’s go!”  
\-------  
The priest did have an address in an ordinary suburban area, not far from the highway and the house did look exactly like a hundred other houses out there. The lawn was well maintained and the house was nice but not overly so. Bard felt a bit nervous when they knocked on the door, they didn’t know what to expect at all. The man who came to the door could have been an accountant, or someone working in a call centre or something like that. He had short hair, no beard and a sad sort of greyish face. The clothes were as plain as they come and he did look older than the information said he was. “Yes?”

Bard held up his badge. “We are here about a certain Mr Wayne Dale?” 

The man seemed to shrink, he wiped his brow with his hand. “Oh, do come inn, please” 

Bard did notice that the man was left handed and he did look very sickly. What was this? He did take them to the living room, the house was filled with rather nice furniture but there were no family pictures and it seemed almost empty somehow. It could have been a hotel, there was nothing there which revealed anything about the man living there. Alderic sat down, he sighed and stared at them. “I killed Wayne, just as he asked for. I couldn’t do anything else, it was merciful.” 

Thran frowned. “I hear what you are saying and I know he was dying but why? Why go to such lengths?” 

Alderic smiled, a very sad smile. “To ensure his legacy. If he had told Samantha of his disease she would have moved heaven and earth to save him, spending every last dime on a treatment that anyhow would be too late. He did this to ensure that she would live her life comfortably when he was gone.” 

Bard leaned forth. “But why did you kill him? Why did he chose you?”

Alderic sighed and leaned back, the skin of his face seemed to sag and he was skinny. “I was the priest of the group in which the two of them met, and I love them both. I lost my own family twenty years ago and I found some peace in the belief I know preach. I guess I saw Samantha and Wayne as my children in a way.” 

Thran was staring at him. “And?” 

Alderic sort of grimaced. “I followed our faith, he would have died in a bad way, I saved him from that fate. It was my duty” 

The tall blonde was squinting. “That is not the only reason” 

Alderic sort of shrugged. “No, it was murder in the eyes of everybody else, and I will not live long enough to go to court. I have the same type of disease as Wayne, cancer. It is a different type but no less lethal. I will face my end soon and accept it, but he wanted to make sure that his beloved could live well even without him. Nobody will mourn me, but I will be remembered” 

Bard scoffed. “He did really make an elaborate plan now didn’t he?”

Alderic smiled wryly. “Oh yes, his head left at the club by me, disguised as one of the caterers, the collection, everything. He gave the animal shelter two very precious teddy bears by the way, they ought to keep them going for at least five more years” 

Thran sighed. “You trashed the apartment and everything to make it look like an assault” 

Alderic nodded, his eyes were shining. “Yes, to make people aware of the fish tank with the key, then he drank some strong sleeping draught and I…killed him. I had sworn to, there was no way back.” 

Bard stared at Thran. “How the heck do we explain this?” 

Alderic stared at them, eyes wide. “Please, do not tell anybody that I did it because of what he wanted. Tell them I killed him in cold blood, for the collection. Or else it has been in vain. She won’t get the insurance money.” 

Thran looked a bit confused. “She will still get the money from the collection?” 

Alderic nodded. “Yes, but he wants her to have so much more. Please, I beg you both. I will stick to my story about murdering him and confess to it all, just let me fulfil his last wish” 

The two looked at each other, their eyes a bit glazed and then Thran nodded. “It is a deal, we won’t tell a soul” 

Alderic let out a sigh of relief, he did look almost happy. “Then my life and my death has meant something, there is nothing better than that gentlemen” 

He held his hands out and smiled. “So, shall we?” 

Bard sighed and got up, smacked the handcuffs onto the thin wrists. He had to have struggled to be able to cut the head off a man like Wayne but who were they to question that? Thor would be pleased, the newspapers would be pleased and the prosecutors would be pleased. It would all end well and then why bother ruining it? 

Alderic was promptly locked away and Samantha did get all the money from the insurance and also from the sale of the collection. Wayne had hired a very good expert to sell it to the highest bidder and the sale was finished just a couple of days before Wayne’s funeral. Samantha got his body back, the people at the morgue had managed to attach his head again and hide the ghastly wound rather well with wax and colour and Bard and Thran did watch the funeral from a distance. It was bizarre, most there were dressed like Vikings or in medieval clothes and some wore black leather, black boots and other metal paraphernalia. It was a very strange crowd for sure. 

Wayne was burned and now Thran and Bard realized that even if Samantha said they had been divorced that didn’t mean that they were legally divorced. She was still his wife on paper and thus she was next of kin and could determine what sort of ceremony they were to use. Wayne was burned like a warrior of old in a boat by the beach and the crowd was wandering around it as they sang. It was in fact rather nice and very respectable. Some of Wayne’s kin had showed up too, looking extremely uncomfortable.

A priest was singing something out loud and it did sound rather archaic, some were humming along and Bard wondered what it was all about. Thran was listening intently. “I think this may be out of the havamål, a sort of list of wise advice from the gods.” 

Bard nodded. “Yes, that fits well” 

The crowd was chanting along now as the pyre burned down. 

Deyr fé,  
deyja frændr,  
deyr sjalfr it sama,  
ek veit einn,  
at aldrei deyr:  
dómr um dauðan hvern.

It was impossible to understand but it had power. They both stood there until the pyre had burned down and people left. Bard stared at Thran. “I think we did the right thing” 

Thran shrugged. “I know we did the right thing, even if we did with hold a wee bit of information” 

Bard had to grin. “What people doesn’t know will never harm them ha?” 

Thran hugged him and chuckled. “Damn right it won’t” 

The club and the bands playing there became very popular indeed and Samantha was suddenly wealthy and could live pretty much as she liked. Alderic got sent off to a prison while awaiting the trial and as he was there he managed to piss off one very large and very volatile prisoner who shanked him in the shower and thus according to his belief sent him on his way to Valhalla and thus everybody were pleased in the end, even the newspapers. The case was closed and Thran and Bard knew that they had done a good thing, even if it was a very unusual ending to a murder case.


	6. Welcome to the jungle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A serial killer is on the loose but as the case moves forth they soon realize that this is so much worse than they'd ever imagine....

Welcome to the jungle…

Peter was hurrying as he ran down the corridor, he was late for work again. It wasn’t the first time and it wouldn’t be the last one either, he had a nasty tendency to hit the snooze button one time too many and this morning he had been very tired. His girlfriend Nancy had been in a very bad mood the evening before and they had had a very nasty fight and when they finally eased down and put it behind them it was way past midnight. He felt guilty, he knew that old Baldric hardly cared if he was twenty minutes late with the morning feed but he liked the old lion and the old guy was so decrepit solid routines were very important. The job as a zoo keeper was a good one, he loved animals and preferred them to humans anytime. Baldric was ancient, he had been a grown individual when the zoo got him as a gift from another smaller zoo which had to close down and now they had no idea just how old the cat was. But he was skinny, had lost most of his teeth and was half blind. 

The leadership had suggested euthanizing the poor thing several times but Baldric seemed to enjoy life, even if he had to be fed special food and had to stay in his tiny enclosure the whole time. It was special made with heating since the cat had problems with his joints and it was almost hidden at the back of the zoo. Few ever came to see Baldric since he wasn’t huge and intimidating. But Peter loved that lion and knew that you couldn’t find a more harmless cat anywhere. He ran into the small kitchen where they prepared the food for the animals and luckily Dana who was in charge of the diets had prepared the bowl with stew already, it was on the counter and Peter grabbed it and walked towards the enclosure. There was a hatch through which the bowl was to be pushed, they didn’t approach the animals in person anymore, not since a tiger had ripped the arm off a keeper five years earlier. 

He stopped, Baldric usually waited by the hatch and he felt a sudden surge of worry, was Baldric sick? Had he gone to his ancestors during the night? The lion was so old they all expected him to drop dead at any time now. He tilted his head, listened. There was a soft growling sound coming from the enclosure, the sort of sound Baldric made when he was really enjoying his food and Peter blinked, had someone already fed him? He wasn’t that late goddamn it, just a mere twenty minutes. Then he heard something else, a sort of soft rasping sound and something wet and he swallowed hard and bent down, stared in through the observation window. What he saw made him stagger backwards, hand pressed against his mouth. Baldric was happily licking away at a bloody corpse, the lions rough tongue had ripped the skin off the body and blood covered the concrete, Baldric had to have been at it for quite a while for the thin coat was covered with blood everywhere and as he watched the lion sort of manhandled the body with a massive paw and continued to lick the blood off it. Peter couldn’t think, the only thing on his mind was that he just hoped that Baldric hadn’t killed that person for then he would be put down, beyond any doubt.   
\-------  
The bay outside of the city was rather shallow but very nice and many sought some relaxation out there on warm days. The boats weren’t allowed to move very fast due to the fact that the area was home to many rare birds and also some types of fish which were rather precious to the local fishermen. They weren’t many, just five men did fish these waters commercially now and they were all specialists who sought just one type of catch. That way they didn’t compete with each other. Duane McHook was the fourth generation of his family to fish these waters and his preferred catch was a type of crab which was very sought after by the local restaurants. A good catch could bring more money than others made in a week and he was a very dedicated person who loved this area and tried to protect it by all costs. He hated the tourists and their fast and noisy boats, they disturbed that age old peace and showed less than no respect for anyone or anything. 

This morning he was checking his traps, they were placed far out from the shore at his special place, a sort of underwater canyon where you always found at least some crabs. He had been there the day before and both the traps had been full, he had received a very generous check from the chefs at one of his best customers. The restaurant was very posh and they only used the very best ingredients and thus they bought their crabs from him and nobody else, they knew he always provided them with the very best specimens. He found the floater which told him where his traps were and he pulled them up, they were heavy and he smiled. Yet another good catch. Tomorrow he would remove them and move to another location, you never fished the same place for more than two days in a row, no sir, you let the crabs in peace again for some weeks so you didn’t overfish the area. 

The traps were full and all the crabs were above the minimum size, it was wonderful, yet some grand would find their way to his pockets this evening. He was tossing the traps back into the water when he did notice that something did move in the water not far from his boat, he pushed his cap up and squinted. Was that a dolphin? He loved dolphins, they were among his favourite creatures and he often saw the local pod. They would often swim around the boat and keep him company and Duane knew that they were more than just animals, they were like people, just with flippers instead of hands. He whistled and received an answer, the dolphin did sound distressed and it moved in a strange manner? Oh shit, was it tangled in some goddamn plastic garbage? He had seen that way too many times and he absolutely hated the fact that the boats dropped just about anything overboard without thinking about the environmental impact of it. He felt frantic and grasped his boat hook, the dolphin got closer and the sounds it made were pitiful, it seemed to have problems with its tail fin. 

Something was indeed wrapped around it, it looked like rope and Duane cussed so hard it was a wonder the water didn’t burst into flames, had someone been out there placing illegal nets during the night? That had happened before and the dolphins and other marine creatures often got tangled in them and perished. The dolphin lifted its head out of the water and squeaked, he bent down and petted the smooth head. “There there pretty one, I am gonna free you, worry not!”

The local dolphins knew him and he found his fishing knife and grasped the rope with strong hands, a dolphin is extremely powerful and a strike from the tail fin could easily knock him out but he didn’t fear that at all, the animal knew he was trying to help it. The rope was new and very strong but he had a sharp knife and before long he had freed the poor creature. The dolphin did squeal cheerfully and slapped its fins against the water before it swam off and he felt very relieved, he had done something very good and he started to haul at the rope to get rid of it. If this was an illegal net it was going to get burned this very evening, the owner wouldn’t get it back, no way! It was heavy, was this really a net at all? He started to suspect that this could be something way more sinister, some smugglers did drop packets of drugs and such off near the coast and then the receivers came to retrieve the goods the next night. He cursed again, hauling away at break neck speed, he wanted this dealt with as fast as possible. The crabs had to be delivered while they were alive and fresh. 

The weight was huge, and he was struggling as he pulled the heavy object up towards the surface. He leaned forth and stared down, it was pale and elongated and he felt a sickening feeling in his chest. This was no packet of illegal substances, this was a body and as the head did break the surface Duane knew it, this was going to be one hell of a day indeed! 

\------------------------  
The police officer who walked down the narrow road wasn’t anticipating anything out of the ordinary, this was an area where cars weren’t allowed and the streets were filled with people and booths filled with all sorts of things. He enjoyed the scents and sounds and smiled at a few of the street vendors, they all knew him. It was still early in the day and there weren’t that many customers out there yet. He had patrolled this area for almost fifteen years and knew everybody who lived in this part of the city very well. It was peaceful and very little happened there. He was just two years away from retirement and he guessed that his last years would be as undisturbed as the previous ones. He started to feel a bit hungry, one of the shops did sell the most delicious cakes and he contemplated dropping by, just to check that things were alright. Mrs Denver always spoiled the boys in blue with some of her creations. He was heading towards the entrance when a scream pierced the air, he jerked and blinked, oh no, what was this? 

He grasped for his gun and felt his hands shake, the screaming stopped and the door to one of the small shops was thrown open, an elderly woman staggered out, looking very pale. He rushed forth and she saw him, the look of relief on her face was rather endearing. “Oh officer Brown, God bless you, there…there is a dead man in the backyard!”

Officer Brown knew there was a backyard there, a small open room where the shops kept their equipment. He held the woman gently and remembered her name after a bit of a struggle, she sold yarn and other hobby equipment and she was probably in her eighties. “Mrs Danlier, are you sure?” 

She nodded. “Oh yes, oh dear lord, he was sitting by the table in the corner and when I touched him he just flipped forwards, he is dead for sure. It is horrible!”

The officer followed the woman through the shop and into the backyard, it was filled with everything from spare furniture to crates of goods and a body did in fact sit in one of the chairs by a small garden table, slumped forwards. It appeared to be a grown man and he was rather bulky and wore a very nice suit. Officer Brown saw no blood, could this be someone who had felt ill and sought a place to sit and rest and then died there? It could be a heart attack or something like that, that would mean no extra work for him. He hoped that this was so straight forward as he gently tilted the body backwards again into an upright position. Then he knew that he was going to be disappointed, this was no mere heart attack, this was something so much worse, much much worse. He covered his mouth with his hand before he staggered backwards, praying that this wasn’t contagious, whatever it was!   
\------------------------

Judith was usually a person who had an answer to just about anything, few could even imagine what it would take to make her speechless. But this… She stared at the three bodies laying side by side on identical tables and she just knew it, this was most unusual, in oh so many ways. She had received the first body early that morning, directly from a zoo where an old lion had been eagerly removing the skin of the corpse. The cause of death was hard to find due to this fact and yet there were some eerie similarities to the other two. The other one came in from the bay area, found dumped in the water. He did look as if he had been in the water for no more than a day or two, luckily for her. She hated corpses found in the sea, they did decay so fast and got terribly bloated. The last one was found in the backyard of some building complex and the cop who called it in had been terrified of some sort of exotic disease. Judith could understand that, the guy did look bizarre. As did they all. But three dead within two hours and all with some of the same physiological changes? She didn’t like it at all, she wiped her hands and bit her lower lip, the bodies were covered with sheets right now but she would need to do a thorough autopsy as soon as she had identified them all. The last two victims were easy enough but the guy from the lion cage? She would need to check the dental records for that one. 

There were footprints heard from the stairway and she took a deep breath and put on a smile. Bard and Thran did appear in the doorway and both looked at the three bodies with narrow eyes. “What do you think of this Judith?” 

She sighed and made a grimace. “Well, as far as I can tell right now all three died of the same thing but I have no idea what that thing may be” 

Bard stared at the body closest to him, the sheet was raised slightly near the man’s mid section and he blinked. “Ah Judith, do they all…?”

She nodded. “Yes, I am not so sure about the guy from the lion’s den but the other two does have a rather raging erection yes. I bet the first guy had one too but unfortunately Baldric the lion has devoured it” 

Thran cringed and Bard sort of whistled. “So this is no coincidence?”

Judith shook her head. “Absolutely not, nope! These three were murdered for sure but I cannot for my dear life understand how. It has to be some sort of poison but I know of none which gives that sort of effect?” 

Thran frowned. “I once heard of this spider which can cause erections in bite victims?” 

Judith nodded. “Yes, a species from South America, very nasty critter indeed but this is no spider bite. They all seem to have ingested something, there is blood in their airways. “ 

Bard took a deep breath. “So, have you identified the victims?” 

Judith went over to her desk. “The last two yes, here is the papers” 

She handed over two folders with the little information she had found so far. Bard opened the first one. “Thomas Wickerfield, age 56, real estate agent. Reported missing this very morning by his wife, was supposed to return home last night from a business meeting but never did” 

She nodded. “Yes, he was found in a backyard, the cop who called it in first thought it was a heart attack.” 

Thran took a look at number two. “Steven Darsley, 54, worked for a beauty clinic? What the heck? Divorced with no kids, owns an apartment down town?” 

Judith smiled. “Apparently this guy was an expert at taking care of peoples feet.” 

Thran scoffed. “Alright, and the first dude?” 

Judith raised her shoulders. “I have sent an X ray of the teeth to the register, they should find him if he is in the records” 

Bard cringed. “Please tell me he was dead when he was tossed inn with that lion?” 

Judith grinned. “Most definitely, and even if he had been alive old Baldric would most likely just have jogged over and demanded to be petted, that lion is “the sweetest cat” alive according to his keeper” 

Thran grimaced. “And yet this sweet cat did remove a guy’s skin completely. I don’t think that is very sweet at all” 

Judith just shrugged. “A cat is a cat is a cat. The blood must have been irresistible to him poor old puss.” 

Bard stared at the three bodies again. “So the deaths are most likely caused by a poison of some sorts, we have to check if they have something in common then, or if we have some maniac on the loose who kills randomly” 

Judith shook her head. “Nope, you don’t. They are all men in their fifties. It has to mean something. They are all rather well off and from what I have seen so far none of them have any sort of defensive wounds or anything which indicates a violent attack.” 

Bard was about to answer when the door at the back of the room swung open and one of the workers entered pushing a stretcher ahead of him, with yet another covered body. “Here Judith, you have one more customer, came in just now. Female in her early fifties, found in her garden just half an hour ago by her daughter” 

Judith gaped. “Oh God, please don’t tell me that…” 

She went over and peeked under the sheet, she put it down again and blinked twice. “Fuck!”

Bard wetted his lips. “Uh…what?” 

Judith closed her eyes. “It is the same, it is the bloody same. We have a serial killer gentlemen” 

Thran went over and lifted the sheet, the woman was ghastly pale but the veins in the neck and face were clearly visible and dried froth and blood covered the mouth and the nostrils, the eyes were bulging and the expression told of agony and panic. “Poor soul!”

Judith went over to her work bench and found a syringe, she started to draw blood from the corpse. “I have to find this poison, whatever it was, it has worked very fast” 

Bard tilted his head. “I thought most poisons were well known?” 

Judith shook her head. “Heck no, we find new ones each year. New species of bugs, plants, algae, whatever. Just last year they found a new species of mushroom just outside of the capital, looks exactly like an edible relative but gives some horrific hallucinations before the person dies of internal bleeding. Nasty nasty stuff. “ 

Thran looked as if he didn’t quite believe this. “Just last year?!”

She put the vials of blood into containers and started writing something on them. “Yes, the natives knew of it of course but when did we white ever listen to them?” 

She pushed a button and one of the workers came running. “This goes to the lab now, and it is urgent. And tell them that this is a potential level four, got it?” 

The young man nodded and stared at the bag of vials like it contained a live cobra. Thran did look intrigued. “Level four?” 

She nodded. “Yes biohazard level four, it is a term used for really nasty stuff, like Ebola and Sars virus and Smallpox and shit like that. I have no idea what this is so it is way better to be too careful than to be too sloppy” 

The computer on the work bench beeped and Judith ran over, she did look excited. “Ah, yes, they have found the first guy. Let me see” 

She printed something and handed it over to Thran. “Chong Baker, aged 54, computer expert, lives in the suburb with a wife and three kids. Was supposed to be at a conference?” 

Judith stared at them. “All the victims are in the same age span, and they are all employed with good jobs. There has to be a common factor here somewhere. This is vicious guys, this stuff kills fast but it is far from pleasant and this many people?” 

Thran nodded. “Yes, the culprit wants them to suffer, wants them to die slowly and in agony but whoever it is doesn’t want to get his or hers hands dirty. Poison is a very impersonal way of killing someone, you don’t have to be there in person.”

Bard frowned. “So what do you think?” 

Thran took a deep breath. “The killer is either a physically weak male or a woman, and there has to be some pretty strong emotions behind this. Something almost extreme.” 

Bard nodded. “Right, we have to get upstairs and see if we can find the thing which connects these people. “ 

They bid Judith bye and ran upstairs, started to check the four dead people. None of them had any criminal record, they were all good citizens and paid their taxes and they appeared to live ordinary happy lives. There were no common ground there though, it didn’t appear as if these four people even knew of each-other’s existence for their lives never touched in any way. After a few hours they had gone through everything they could find and there were nothing, not even a thing like a shared favourite restaurant or a gym. Bard got up. “The daughter of the woman, Lizzy Green, we need to interview her” 

Thran sighed. “You are right, there are always things you cannot find just by using the computer now isn’t there?” 

They told Thor where they were going and then they were off. The murder scene was still sealed off and some CSI technicians were still rummaging around in the garden, trying to find anything which was out of place. The daughter proved to be a very attractive blonde in her twenties and she was sitting in a couch red eyed and in obvious shock. Thran sat down and she sniffled and tried to smile but failed. “I cannot believe that this is true, it has to be some sort of mistake, my mother was the kindest person there is, who would have wanted to harm her?!”

Thran smiled at her, took her hand and held it gently. “Ms Green, is there anything you can think off which may help us? Your mother was most definitely murdered but we have no idea of how that happened. Or why!”

The girl swallowed hard. “Like I said, mom had no enemies, everybody loved her but I saw an odd letter on her desk some days ago, or letter, it was more of a note really. I asked her about it but she just waved me off and said it was nothing” 

Bard frowned. “A note, what did it say?” 

She did wring her hands. “Don’t think that I have forgotten, you will all pay” 

Bard tilted his head. “And that was all?” 

She nodded. “Yes, written on a computer, huge bold angry letters” 

Thran looked as if he was thinking. “That could indicate that this is something related to her past, to something which possibly could be many years ago” 

Bard nodded. “Yes, it has to be. Ms Green, what can you tell me of your mother’s past?” 

She took a deep breath. “Ah, well, she graduated from college at age 23, then she worked for an accountant firm for a couple of years and after that I think she worked for a small computer company, but that was only for a year I think. Then she got a job at the law firm where she works now.” 

Bard was taking notes. “Right, so, she has only had three jobs?” 

The girl nodded. “Yes, she met dad just after she started working at the law firm and they got married the year after, I was on the way by then. Dad died three years ago, cardiac arrest, he ate way too many burgers that man” 

Thran smiled. “Right, well, then we have something to start with, do you know the name of the computer firm and the accountants?” 

Ms Green closed her eyes. “The accountant firm exist even today, they are huge. Woodgrouse and sons I think. The computer firm went bankrupt I think, but if I remember it right it was called Raplink computers” 

Bard had never heard the name and Thran made a note of it. “Thank you Ms Green, you will hear from us later.” 

She wiped her eyes. “Please, find the one who did this to my mother?” 

Bard nodded. “We will, take care of yourself now and we will stay in touch” 

Thran sighed as they returned to the car. “I think it is something in her work history, neither of these people are the type to fool around. From what I have seen all four were close to being directly boring in private” 

Bard started the car and listened to the purr of the engine for a few seconds, it always calmed him down, even when the world went to shit he could trust his cruiser. “Yes, we need to check if any of the others worked at any of those places.” 

Thran smiled. “Do we call Elisa?” 

Bard grasped the radio. “Yes, we call Elisa”   
\-----------------------------  
Judith was cutting away at the first body, and she was more and more aghast by what she found. It seemed as if this poor persons lungs had started to disintegrate into lung mosh while the person was still alive and the throat and larynx was severely swollen. The heart looked like a balloon and many of the smaller blood vessels in the body had ruptured due to the extreme pressure. She had never heard of anything like this ever. The lung tissue did look severely inflamed and she was confused. There was nothing there, no injuries from smoking or exposure to pollution, just the normal stuff you find in the lungs of all city dwellers due to the heavy traffic and she tried to think. It had to have happened fast, the victims didn’t find the time to call for help, what poison does that?   
She finished this body and moved on and it was the same sad tale in all of them, she pulled the sheets back and sighed. “Someone really hated you all, I wonder why” 

There was a knock on the door and the messenger she had sent off to the lab entered, he carried a folder with papers. “This came now, they are scratching their heads like mad upstairs” 

Judith cringed. “Uh-oh, that doesn’t sound very promising” 

She opened the folder and stared at the sheets of text. “What does it say?” 

The guy was obviously curious and Judith felt a surge of frustration. “That it isn’t any poison they know, it isn’t in any database anywhere. In fact the blood didn’t contain anything at all except what it is supposed to contain”

The guy frowned. “Ha?!”

Judith nodded. “Exactly, this is getting more and more weird by the second” 

She took a deep breath. “I have to take tissue samples, there is no other way. The thing which killed these people has to be there, somewhere and I am gonna find it” 

The guy smiled but it was a thin smile. “Good luck with that” 

Judith went over to find some new gloves. “Thanks, I feel as if I am gonna need it!”  
\-------------------------  
Bard and Thran rushed into the office just to be met by a very exited Elisa. “Guys, they all worked for that computer firm, at the same time!” 

Bard smashed his hand into the table. “There we have it, it has to be the thing which connects them all. “ 

Elisa handed them a note. “This is the name and address of the founder of that company, she still lives here in the city. I bet she can tell you more” 

Bard grasped the note. “Mrs Dahlia Sharit, upper Birchstreet 45. That is a posh neighbourhood” 

Thran nodded. “I know it yes, we better get going then” 

Bard couldn’t help himself, he did smack his husbands behind. “Yes, let’s go” 

They stormed out yet again, with a feeling that they really was onto something.   
\---------  
The drive to upper Birchstreet was a long one but they put the sirens on and made it in record time and they discovered that Mrs Sharit was an elderly woman in her eighties who lived in a very luxurious mansion with some servants and a veritable horde of small yapping dogs. They were all around the two investigators and Bard felt a sudden urge to kick, it felt like being surrounded by vicious bloodthirsty lemmings. Mrs Sharit was very nice though, and she was obviously very glad she could help for she started to search for her old papers right away. “I do have the personal files here somewhere, you see, I never toss papers away” 

Her voice was thin and cracking and she was using a hearing aid but she was a very sweet old lady and Bard did suspect that she was of Indian origin. After a while she found the right files and brought them back to the very beautiful teak table they all were sitting by. “Here, I remember the names you see for they were all in a very special group my son put together.”

Bard did blink. “A special group?” 

She nodded and a servant did slide over and poured tea into their cups, it was black as tar and probably just as strong. “Yes, my son was the real owner of the firm, my name was on the papers since I was rather wealthy. My family was nobility you see and my late husband did invest a lot when we came to the US and made the fortune grow, he was a very wise man indeed. But my son wanted to explore these new inventions, computers and such and I didn’t want his name to be tarnished if something went wrong so it was all mine on paper” 

She took a sip of the tea and they did the same, to be polite. Thran rolled his eyes and choked a cough and Bard managed to swallow without spreading a mist of tea all over the surroundings, but just by luck. The tea was so strong it burned! “ And the special group?” 

She didn’t appear to notice the distress of her guests, or she was so used to how people did react to the infernal tea she had stopped bothering with it. “Yes, the group. He found people who were creative and used to thinking outside of the box and they started to explore the possibilities this new technology gave. Programs, hardware, everything really.” 

Thran was listening intently. “So they came up with new ideas? Did any of them become reality?” 

She nodded. “Oh yes, quite a few. New ways to cool down the hard drives of large computers, games, better graphic engines. They made lots of stuff which is in use still” 

Bard stared at Thran. “Alright, and your son?” 

She sighed. “He died suddenly, he was too fond of flashy cars and drove off the road in his brand new Lamborghini, wrapped it around a telephone pole. I warned him about that car, yes I did. Something which is made just to move fast is not to be trusted” 

Thran did write it down. “And the firm?” 

She sighed. “I shut it down the year after his accident, I didn’t have the same drive and interest as him, and I have never understood computers at all. So everybody were told to find new work somewhere else. They were good people so I didn’t doubt that they would be employed again rather fast” 

Bard smiled. “And all the dead worked for the group?” 

She nodded. “Oh yes, but there were two more in the group you know” 

Thran leaned forth, his eyes were a bit wild. “Two more?!”

She smiled, a sweet smile. “Oh yes, one African American male and a girl, let me see here” 

She handed them a paper and there they saw the names of all the dead people plus two. Alexander Plowman and Erzebeth Black. Thran swallowed. “If the killer is after that group then these people are in danger, thank you for the tea Mrs Sharit, we have to go” 

She just waved her hand. “Oh it was my pleasure, it has been so long since I was visited by handsome young men. Do come back” 

They nodded and ran out the door, Bard was on the phone. “Elisa, the addresses of two persons named Alexander Plowman and Erzebeth Black, asap!”

She answered. “Right, I am on it, stand by” 

Thran frowned. “Erzebeth? That is an odd name”

Bard opened the car door and sat down. “It is from Europe, Hungary I think. Their old version of Elisabeth. Have you heard of the countess of blood?” 

Thran shook his head. “Nope, I cannot say I have”

Bard started the engine. “She was a noble woman who was so afraid of growing old and wrinkled she was said to have bathed in the blood of young virgins, her name was Erzebeth” 

Thran just shrugged and they took off, Bard had a feeling of haste. Elisa was back online. “I have found Alexander, he lives in a town ten miles south of the city. West harbour. He owns a warehouse and lives in what used to be a horse ranch” 

She sent the address over and Bard turned on the sirens yet again and this time he used the lights too. “The fastest route to that place is the old highway and then this backroad here!” 

Thran pointed at the map on the screen and Bard nodded. “I agree, going through the city now is impossible, the roads are clogged with traffic already” 

He pushed the car and Thran used the radio again. “Elisa, anything on the woman?” 

She sounded as if she was far away. “No, nothing, seems as if she has disappeared from the face of the earth. I have found nothing at all and that is goddamn odd!” 

Thran frowned. “Nothing?!”

Elisa was obviously typing very fast. “Exactly zero, there is not a goddamn thing to find about her after the firm was shut down” 

Bard stared at Thran. “Now that is indeed odd.” 

Thran grinned. “Yes, let us hope that we find this Alexander guy alive, he could shed some light on everything for sure.” 

The old horse ranch had been transformed into a very hip modern house with a huge garden and the paddocks had been replaced by a tennis court and a parking lot. It was obvious that this Plowman was very fond of cars for the stable had been rebuilt as a garage with some very nice specimen. Bard stared at the row of shining bonnets. “Jaguar, Bentley, is that a Rolls Royce?!”

Thran nodded. “Indeed it is, all these are old cars, veterans. He must be collecting them” 

Bard sighed. “In other words, the guy is loaded!” 

Thran shrugged and walked towards the entrance. “Apparently yes” 

The entrance door was a beautiful example of art nouveau and as they approached it they heard the barking of a dog, it did sound rather hysterical and Bard winced. “Oh god, don’t tell me he too has a herd of yapping abominations?” 

Thran listened. “Nope, that sounds more like something at the opposite end of the scale, it sounds huge” 

Bard cringed again. “Great, a bloodthirsty pit bull is just what we need now” 

Thran tilted his head. “I don’t think Mr Plowman would want a pit bull, it wouldn’t fit with the house and the cars and his wealth. I think this may be some sort of hound”

He rang the bell and they heard it rather well. Nothing happened, except from that the dog started to bark again, even louder. They tried one more time and Thran stared at Bard. “All the cars are in the garage, I cannot see any cars missing” 

Bard turned around, he felt a sinking feeling. Something was wrong. “Thran, the note? I haven’t forgotten? I don’t like this” 

Thran took a deep breath and touched the door knob, the door was unlocked and he slid the door open gently. “Mr Plowman? We are from the police…” 

A huge mass of fur and legs suddenly appeared in the nearest doorway, the hall was elegant and showed lots of taste and it was obvious that the dog was bought to match the interior. Bard gaped. “An Irish wolfhound?!”

Thran shook his head. “No, rarer, an Irish deerhound, slightly smaller and almost unknown outside of its country of origin” 

The dog ran towards them, tail wagging desperately and it was whining and whimpering the whole time. It was apparently not a vicious dog at all. “Where is your master boy?”

Thran petted the dog on the head but Bard backed off, the dog was the size of a small heifer or so he felt. The dog whined again and grasped Thran’s sleeve gently, tried to pull him along. Thran stared at Bard. “You are right, something is wrong.” 

He followed the dog and Bard did draw his gun, they suddenly felt a whiff of a very unpleasant smell and Bard had to groan. “Oh shit”

Thran nodded. “That too, nobody has walked the dog since yesterday I think, but yes, something is dead in here.” 

They entered a longue with several very nice couches and tables and the room was very cozy, except from the fact that a dead man lay in the middle of the expensive afghan carpet which formed the centre of the room. “We were too late” 

Thran’s voice was very low and Bard holstered his gun. “Goddamn it, fuck!!”

The dog laid down and appeared to be mourning its dead master and Thran bit his lower lip and looked very distraught. “We have to call this in, are there any security cameras here?”

Bard raised his head. “This place is full of expensive stuff, he has to have some sort of surveillance here” 

He soon found a camera hidden behind a book shelf and followed the wires which were expertly camouflaged. They did merge with other wires and lead to a room at the back of the house and Bard opened the door and walked in only to turn around and run back outside again with a gasp and a feeling of being choked. There had been a person working in there, probably a security guard and the man laid over the controls with his head crushed into a pulp. The tool laid next to him on the floor, a piece of steel pipe and the entire control unit was smashed into smithereens. “Awwww, you have got to be kidding me!!”

Thran came running, wide eyed and the dog started to howl, long mournful sounds which made the whole situation rather bizarre. “By my grandmother’s knickers, that is bad, that is very bad” 

Bard leaned forth, tried to breathe normally. “No shit Sherlock, this killer doesn’t mind killing also innocent bystanders” 

Thran nodded. “Yes, but he or she is also ice cold and very organized. What the fuck is this really about?” 

Bard cringed. “Beats me, so, what do we do now?” 

Thran seemed to think. “Call in the CSI’s, but I doubt they will find anything at all. This culprit knows what he or she is doing” 

Bard frowned. “Could a woman really do that? I mean, smash someone’s head inn?” 

Thran nodded. “Believe it or not yes, women can be just as violent as men if they feel that they have to be. “ 

He walked towards the longue again and the dog laid there, head on its front paws. “And you Finn are coming with us”

Bard frowned. “What?! No, I don’t want that dog in the car!” 

Thran turned and stared at him. “The dog will mourn itself to death if it stays here and it will be in the way when the technicians arrive. We bring him along, if there isn’t anyone claiming him I think we better adopt him don’t you think? The kids will love a dog like this” 

Bard just blinked and Thran turned on his most irresistible smile, the one Bard couldn’t fight at all. “Right, fuck, but Finn?!”

Thran touched the dogs collar. “Says so here. Finn of…something Gaelic I think” 

Bard moaned. “Well, if someone else wants the dog they can have it, how much does a mutt like that eat? He’ll eat us out of the house” 

Thran just laughed. “No he won’t, hounds like this are supposed to be lean, they are sighthounds so with him on the ranch no more prairie dogs” 

Bard just sighed. “Well at least that is something, Jean has spent a fortune on the exterminator and yet those small bastards breed like…rabbits” 

Thran got a new expression on his face. “But all this means that we have to find that Erzebeth woman and that soon. If she has gone underground there is a reason for it and I bet that whoever did this wants to kill her too” 

Bard nodded. “Unless she is the killer of course” 

Thran shrugged. “Then we have an even greater reason to find her.” 

Bard opened the car door and the huge dog hesitated for a moment, then he jumped into the back seat and laid down with a huge sigh. The sad eyes were staring at them through its ragged fur, the dog looked like sorrow incarnate. 

Bard turned towards his partner. “The computer firm has to be the reason why someone is killing them right? Something must have happened back then” 

Thran frowned. “I don’t think we will find that information online, it is too long ago. The web was just in its infancy back then remember?” 

Bard nodded. “Yes, and few owned a personal computer but the newspapers did do the job the web does now” 

Thran grinned. “And the city library has a record of every newspaper ever published here back to the 17 hundreds. What are we waiting for?” 

Bard called Thor and explained and several cruisers entered the yard before they took off, the vans with the coroner and the CSI technicians right behind them. The library was a huge building placed next to the city square and it was impressive and awe inspiring. Bard had rarely been there but Thran just strolled in through the door as if he owned the place. The place was just as grand on the inside and Bard felt as if he had just entered a cathedral. Not a religious one but one dedicated to the worship of the written word. It was silent there and some students were assembled in a corner where several large tables had been placed in tight rows. They were apparently working very hard with something. Thran walked straight up to the desk and smiled, the lady behind the counter seemed to melt completely and sent him a sheepish grin back. “Good day to you Ma’am, we are with the police and we need to see the newspaper collection” 

The woman grinned. “Of course sir, just follow me” 

She walked towards a staircase which lead down towards the basement and they entered another room which was just as large as the one above it but with a more normal roof height. Shelf upon shelf filled the floor and Bard groaned. “Oh sweet Jesus, how many books and magazines are down here really?” 

The woman smiled, she was a rather sturdy lady wearing thick glasses and a dress which had been fashionable when Bard was a teenager. But she was rather cute and she had a very lively expression in her eyes, she giggled. “Oh some millions, we collect everything you see. Now, what year are you after!”

Thran said the year the firm went out of business and she walked over to a machine which showed micro slides. “This is the best choice then, is there anything specific you are looking for?” 

Bard nodded. “Yes, a computer firm, Raplink I think it was called?” 

The woman giggled again. “Please, call me Rita, we do have a search function here you see, I can use that first to find the right week at least” 

She typed the word into a small computer next to the machine and the screen came to life and showed a row of dates. “There you are, week 22 to 25 of that year, and this firm was mentioned a lot in several newspapers. May I ask what this is about? I may be able to help?” 

Bard frowned but Thran nodded. “We need all the help we can get I am afraid, five people have been murdered and one person may be in danger but we cannot find that person, she has gone missing completely” 

Rita gasped. “Oh my, that is dreadful, murdered how?”

Bard made a grimace. “Ah, it is pretty gross, the dead have all been poisoned somehow, by some poison which causes swelling of the throat, dissolving lung tissue and …well, a raging erection in males” 

Rita went a bit rigid, then she blinked and her eyes were huge. “Oh Lord, I think I know what that is?!” 

Thran gasped, “You do? The coroner had no idea, nor did the lab?!”

Rita nodded. “Oh I don’t find that hard to believe for this is something extremely rare, wait here, I have to find a book!” 

She ran off and the two men stared at each other, it made sense, a librarian has access to a heck of a lot of information most people would never even show an interest inn. Bard started to look for the dates she had found and before long Rita returned, carrying a book which was so huge it was a miracle she was able to lift it. It did look very old though and she wore gloves as she laid it onto a table with great care. “This is one of the best botanical atlases ever made, a botanist in the 1880’s made it and this is one of only five copies ever made”

Bard sort of stepped away from the book. “Something tells me that this book is very expensive?” 

Rita grinned. “Try irreplaceable, the other copies are lost in time. You couldn’t buy this book with a wheel barrel full of moon gravel and a sack of diamonds. “ 

She turned the thick pages reverently. Bard saw that all the plants were drawn by hand with exquisite detail and it was truly a work of art. He had never seen a more beautiful book. “How come you know about this?” 

Thran’s voice was low and Rita kept turning pages, apparently you had to go page by page so you didn’t harm the old paper. “I remembered something I read some years ago, in a newspaper from some godforsaken place in Arizona or Texas or some other dry place. A local farmer had been found out in his fields, dead as a dodo with a boner and internal bleedings! They claimed it was a rattle snake bite but some local natives solved the riddle.”

Bard felt a surge of curiosity, and new energy. “And?” 

She kept looking and suddenly she opened the book completely and grinned from one ear to the other, they stared at some drawings of a rather anonymously looking plant with small leaves and tiny and very pretty bluish and pink flowers. “Here, this is the culprit. It doesn’t have an English name but the Indians called it “waters bride” It helped them find underground water sources.” 

Thran stared at the drawings. “Really? Is it poisonous?” 

Rita shook her head. “Nope, you could eat it without problems, it is related to many edible plants, like peas and beans. But it has a very long root system and back in the old days you could trace underground rivers by following these little rascals. These days they are on the verge of extinction tough, the farmers have drained the aquafers and turned the once dry dessert into fields and this plant has extremely strict demands when it comes to habitat. It need dry soil, lots of limestone in the ground and almost constant sunlight!” 

Bard felt confused. “So, how did that farmer die?” 

Rita pointed at the drawing. “He was digging a ditch, in the dry season. That is when these little beauties try to reproduce you see, and the seed pods?” 

She pointed at the drawing, one of the flowers there was painted with something which resembled a pea pod underneath it. Rita touched it with her finger nail. “The size of the drawing lies, the pods are tiny, not more than a cm long at the most but they contain a heck of a lot of seeds and they are among the smallest seeds of any known plant. It is like the finest dust.” 

Thran opened his mouth and Bard took a deep breath. “And the seeds are poisonous?” 

Rita slammed her finger nail down onto the drawing. “Damn right they are, but nobody knows just how the poison works, and it is out of the system extremely fast. They think it is a defence system the plant has evolved to ward off prairie dogs, they love to eat anything green.” 

Thran’s voice was hoarse. “Rita, who would know about this?” 

The librarian cocked her head. “Except from this very clever public servant? A botanist with a specialization in rare plants perhaps? Someone from the area where the farmer died? It was all over the news down there” 

Bard felt like a racehorse on the starting line. “And where did the farmer die?” 

Rita had to think for a few seconds. “A farm town called Swiftwater I think, it is in the middle of nowhere” 

Bard stared at Thran. “And how much are you willing to bet that the culprit comes from that town?” 

Thran grinned. “ A lot!” 

Rita was giggling. “Oh this is exciting, if you catch the killer you have to inform me, we don’t get much action down here” 

Bard just mumbled. “No shit” 

Thran found a map on his phone and tried to locate the town. “Bard, it takes two days to drive down there, the culprit must have travelled north in a more comfortable manner don’t you think? Is there any airports close to that town I wonder”

Bard shook his head. “Nope, I don’t think the murderer would travel by plane, you leave a paper trail that way. Look, there is a railway line going through that town and you don’t need that much ID to buy a train ticket.” 

Thran nodded. “Damn it, you are right. And we have trains coming and going each day and every hour. We have to find the name” 

Bard sat down by the micro film machine, started ploughing through the headlines. He soon found the first article about the firm. “Local computer firm claims to have found the holy grail of computer electronics” 

He did read the article rather fast, it didn’t say much except that the firm had created a revolutionary new type of micro chip. Then there were some rather boring articles about the way the owner of the company saw the future of computers and then there was some huge headlines once more. “Local firm proves to be a complete scam, latest discovery proves to be the work of someone else” 

Thran leaned forth over his shoulder. “Industrial espionage?” 

Bard nodded. “I was about to say that too.” 

They went through the rest of the newspapers and apparently the firm had managed to come up with quite a few inventions which made the workers there filthy rich before it was shut down. Bard rubbed his face, he was getting tired. “It was decades ago damn it, why hold a grudge for so long?” 

He opened another newspaper article and stared at it, it was a sort of list of the inventions the firm had put onto the market and underneath was a list of the names of the members of the development group. He froze, the names…there was a distinct difference between this list and the one Mrs Sharit had given them. “Damn it, she changed her name, she isn’t going to show up anywhere if we search for the old one” 

Thran was gaping and Bard grasped his notebook and wrote it down. Erzebeth Black had turned into Elisabeth Schwartz somewhere near the end of the firm. He grasped his cell phone and called Elisa. “It is me, quick, check if any of the railway companies have had a passenger by the name of Elisabeth Schwarz in the past days, and see if you can find anything on that name, asap!” 

Elisa was typing like a mad woman, they could hear it. “Guys, yes, a woman by that name came to the city four days ago, with Southwest and Silverville railroads. It is a cheap company, not much luxury at all.” 

Bard swallowed. “Right, see if you can find her, she has to stay in some hotel, no, try the motels. She isn’t rich, she will want to save money.” 

 

Elisa was grunting. “Alright, I will make some calls.” 

Bard stared at Thran. “If she changed her name without the others knowing this she could probably approach them rather easily, and they wouldn’t suspect anything before it was too late.” 

Thran grasped his phone and dialled a number. “It is Thran, are you still at Ms Greens place? Great, ask the neighbours if they have seen a stranger sometime in the last days, a woman.” 

There was silence and Bard understood that Thran had called one of the technicians. “Thran? Yes, a saleswoman, went from door to door with some sort of catalogue, was selling makeup”

Thran thanked the technician and nodded at Bard. “The perfect disguise, a door to door saleswoman. Most people would let someone like that in.” 

Bard swallowed hard. “She is sinister this one, but why now? And why kill the others?” 

Thran shrugged. “I guess we have to find her to find out” 

Rita returned to the room and she was obviously very eager. “So, have you guys found something!”

Bard nodded. “Yes, but one more question, if you want to kill someone with those seeds, how would one do that?” 

Rita made a grimace. “Stand with the wind at you back and blow the seeds into their face? And make sure you don’t inhale until you are well out of harm’s way” 

Thran looked down. “Bard, we need gasmasks, and nobody is to approach the suspect without one. She has killed innocent people before, she won’t hesitate doing it again” 

Bard nodded. “Yes, but I still…why now? Why wait for more than twenty years?” 

Thran stared at the screen. “Ah, I think the answer may be found here somewhere. They did invent a lot of stuff and some of it wasn’t technically possible back then but now it is common”

Bard nodded. “Let us check the list of inventions again”

He opened the right article and skimmed down the page. Then he slowed down and pointed at a line of text. “This…this is something which came on the market last year?! And the app is worth millions”

Thran opened his phone and went onto google. “Wait a second, here we go. “ 

He was typing and let out a small yip. “Oh bugger, the rights to that programme was bought by a private person twenty years ago and sold again to one of the major programming firms just before it was presented to the public.” 

Bard frowned. “How much did that private person earn?”

Thran was working like mad on the phone. “Sixteen point five millions. Jeeezes, he paid just twelve hundred dollar for the original idea, which he bought from….Raplink development!”

Bard cussed. “There we have it, who is he?” 

Thran closed the phone. “Mr Jupiter Shire, he is a business tycoon and richer than even Thingol. But he has earned it all by being smart and thinking forwards, investing in new stuff all the time. “

Bard just knew it, this man was the next on the list and he was about to make an urgent call when his phone rang. “Elisa here, I found her. She lives at the Riverside motel, it is a cheap ass place. She isn’t inn though, the clerk says she asked for a cab two hours ago, was heading for West Oaks” 

 

Thran swore so bad it was a miracle the celluloid micro films didn’t catch fire and Rita did look very shocked indeed. “That is where Mr Jupiter lives!” 

He stared at Bard. “She is gonna kill him.” 

Bard called Thor, feeling as if he was on the verge of a breakdown. “Thor? It is me, listen, send a swat team, no, all the swat teams to the home of Jupiter Shire, the suspect is probably there and she is very dangerous. Nobody is to approach her without a gas mask, the poison is in some very small seeds and she could be hiding them anywhere.” 

Thor gasped, then he swore and they heard the alarm go off. “Shit, he does have very tight security but one woman with no apparent weapons? If she is smart she has gotten past the guards”

Bard was sweating. “That is what I am afraid off, send everything you have!”

Thor just ended the call and Thran grasped Bard by the arm. “Lets go, we have to hurry, I fear we already are too late.” 

Bard just sent Rita a pale grin as they ran out the door, the librarian did look rather shocked and the stretch to the parking lot was done in record time. Bard let Thran drive, right now he was way calmer than the dark haired man and he knew how to manoeuvre through dense traffic. The area known as West oaks was the best estates in the entire city, only the crème de la crème of the rich and famous lived there and most homes were in the class which requires a bank account the size of the national budget of a small country. The roads were rather packed but the lights and sirens did clear the way and after twenty minutes they raced into the huge park in front of Mr Shire’s mansion. The swat teams had already arrived and the leader ran towards them. “She is here, man, it is…I have never seen anything this bad. The guards, they are all dead” 

Bard moaned. “How many?” 

The swat leader swallowed hard. “Ten men, I knew some of them, best of the best!” 

Thran was pale. “Have you seen her?” 

The tall man nodded. “Yes, she is in the office of Mr Shire, we have her pinned down but we cannot get inside, she has a whole box of that stuff and threatens to shake it if we get any nearer. She demands that he transfers all the money he has earned from that new app to her” 

Bard nodded. “Has she said anything? Made any statements? “

The swat leader nodded. “She is fucking insane man, screaming like a freakin banshee, she says she was the one to come up with the idea and then the others stole the papers and sold the rights to the program behind her back.” 

Bard cringed. “I would have been pissed too but she is taking it way too far!”

Thran stared at the entrance. “Do you have any surveillance tapes of the office?” 

The leader nodded. “Yes, follow me” 

They ran into a room where two swat team members were keeping an eye on the office. Mr Jupiter sat in a chair and he did look very scared, two dead guards lay in front of his desk and next to him was a tall and rather brutish looking woman with grey hair and a face which reminded Bard of a picture he once had seen of the girl from the exorcist, in full make up. This was one mad person. She held a coffee box and they could see that it was filled with black matter. Thran swallowed hard. “Shit, that is enough seeds to kill the entire household, probably the entire block!”

There were swat team men in black uniforms stationed by every door and window but nobody dared to enter, even with gas masks. The box of the deadly seeds were held too close to Mr Shire, if they tried anything even the smallest movement would send the dust like substance straight into his airways. He was typing on a laptop, obviously transferring money and she stood there screaming insults. Her face was red and she was almost foaming at the mouth. Thran stared at the face, the woman seemed to be short of breath and her balance was off, the bloodshot eyes were staring at the man with absolute hatred and malice. “Bard?” 

Bard nodded. “Yes, what is it?” 

Thran was a bit pale. “I just remember one thing I once learned in school, I may be wrong but I don’t think so” 

Bard felt nervous. “Thran? What are you thinking about now? Don’t you do anything stupid…” 

Thran turned to the swat team leader, his voice was tense. “Is there a sprinkler system here in this building, can it be turned on just within certain rooms?” 

The leader did look confused but he nodded. “Yes, not for separate rooms but for the different wings of the building, what are you thinking about?” 

The tall blonde grasped the swat leaders shoulder. “Listen, here is how this ends, when I say go you bring your men in, but make sure that you don’t shoot her, her blood is lethal” 

Bard gaped. “What?!”

Thran nodded slowly. “Yes, she has rabies, look at her! The madness, the sudden urge to kill. Heck, she could have done this last year but she didn’t, because she was sane back then. But now, she is stark raving mad” 

Bard moaned, of course, the increasing violence, the deviousness. It all spoke of a brain in rapid decline. Even a rabid person works just fine until the disease enters the last stage which comes after about two weeks, you just lose all inhibitions and suffer from severe psychological effects like paranoia and anger “The plan?” 

Thran grinned. “Those with rabies are terrified of water, and the water will drench those seeds within seconds, turn them into sludge. “ 

The team leader appeared to be in awe. “Of course, shit, I should have thought of that. What do you need?” 

Thran grinned, a sardonic smile. “Does anybody have a lighter?” 

They ran to the rooms next to the office and the team leader barked orders into the radio. Thran got a lighter and climbed up into a chair, found one of the smoke detectors. “You see, my mother was from Finland and they were terrified of rabid animals, so the kids learned about the disease in school and one way to keep them away if you got attacked was to spray water on them until someone came to help.” 

Bard winced. “Oh God, that is… I wouldn’t let anyone outside if there were rabid animals around, kids least of all!”

Thran looked very calm now. “In a village in Alaska they had a huge problem with rabid foxes some years ago, they gave the kids baseball bats to bring with them along the school road, just in case some fox approached them. The parents told them to just smash the heads inn and leave the carcass for the adults to remove later. But those parents would never let their kids go to school here, along the heavily trafficked roads. It is all a matter of perspective.”

He lit the lighter and held the flame up under the detector. At first nothing happened but suddenly there was a swooshing sound and gallons upon gallons of water fell from the roof. From the office they heard a ghastly sound, a scream so horrible it was hard to believe that a human being could produce something that shrill. The swat team burst in through the doors and Bard and Thran ran in behind them. The coffee box lay on the floor, black sludge dripping from it and the woman was on the floor too, snarling and writhing like mad. The swat soldiers had already cuffed her and someone pulled a thick black bag made from dense fabric over her head. “Watch it, the bitch tries to bite!” 

Mr Shire sat there as pale as a ghost and Thran walked over to the box and stared at it. “This is hazardous material, get a special team in here to remove it and burn the carpet. This stuff is really bad!” 

Mr Shire was gasping for air. “She was…what was that? She was mad…!” 

Thran nodded. “She was rabid, there are lots of bats down south and I bet she has been bitten by one, about two weeks ago!” 

Bard swallowed. “She won’t stand trial now does she?” 

Thran shook his head. “No, she will be dead by tomorrow evening, it has come too far. All they can do is sedate her, but it will be a terrible way to go anyway. The nerves will be fried by then and pain meds won’t work.” 

Bard tried to smile. “So it was the rabies which caused this?” 

Thran nodded. “And an old grudge yes, I bet she was bitter and angry at the others of the group for a long time but she didn’t do anything about it, she was a decent person, until she got bitten.” 

Bard sighed. “But she acted so deliberately, with such good planning” 

Thran squeezed his shoulder. “Yes, for she was an incredibly smart person to begin with, she probably had plans made, which she never would have put into action but probably just served as a way to release some of the hurt she had felt. But with the virus raging around in her brain her stop button was gone and she started to follow her plan. To the T. She was a strong woman, she would have no problems dropping a man into a lion den or throwing a corpse off the pier into the strong currents of the bay.“

Bard frowned. “She made them all meet her somehow” 

Thran nodded. “Yes, by pretending to be someone else, I bet we’ll never know just how she found them, what matters is that she is stopped and people are safe. 

Bard smiled, he felt relived. “So now what?” 

Thran kissed his cheek discretely. “Now we tell Judith of this plant and its deadly seeds, we thank Rita for the help and then we go home and introduce our new dog to the family” 

Bard rolled his eyes. “Thran? We may not be able to keep it, Thran!!”

He was speaking to deaf ears, his husband was already heading for the car where the overgrown mutt was greeting him with a friendly bark. Well, at least it was an intelligent dog, it could have been worse, it could have been an afghan hound. And they did have the same gorgeous blonde hair as Thran so at least there would be no mix ups now. Finn did look rather scruffy compared with Thran’s silky mane.   
“Alright, at least the kids will be thrilled” 

He had already surrendered as he sat down and fastened his seatbelt, it had been a heck of a day, he didn’t want to make it any worse than it already was. And if he acted all sweet and kind Thran would most certainly reward him, yes, that cheered him up again. Dogs or no dogs.


	7. The man behind the mask...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bard and Thran are having a bad day which turns even worse...and a tragedy is revealed.

Chapter 7: The man behind the mask…

Being a fireman wasn’t as glamorous as most believed, in fact it did suck balls at times. Like now, he was sweating like a pig inside of the protective suit and his back was aching. Fighting the fire was bad, cleaning up after it was just as exhausting. The wildfire had swept through an abandoned park area south of town and left nothing but blackened brush and smouldering trees. The area had been too dry to become a good park and the city council had decided that it was to be used for storage of industrial waste instead but so far nobody had put it into use. The old park just laid there, a refuge for wildlife and like a piece of some forgotten world. But now the entire area was scorched, and the fire department had to clean it up to make sure that the fire wouldn’t flare up again later. The soot was a foot deep, since the park was unused the grass had grown very long and so had the bushes, it had been a true jungle. Due to the heat they hadnt been able to go through it right away, they had waited for some days since there had been plenty of other fires to take care off.  
Bob was used to this shit, he often came across the scorched remains of animals when doing this job for not all creatures did think very well and some didn’t try to escape before it was too late, and the wild fires could move fast and with an almost sinister sort of determination, as if the flames were seeking victims deliberately. He had once come across a huge deer, the animal had been running but the flames had been faster and he had smelled it before he saw it, and the odd thing was that the smell was kind of pleasant, like well roasted steak. A friend of him had once attended to a fire at a pig farm and he said that you could smell fried bacon from miles ahead, it had put him off pork for months. Bob didn’t mind, he did his job and thought about the paycheck, if you started feeling sorry for the poor beasts you would go nuts. They had found three roasted rattle snakes and a racoon so far and he was rather sure they would find more before the day was over.  
He stopped and sniffed, yep, burned flesh. There was something rather large ahead and he waved to his partner. “Yo, Freddy, we have something large up ahead, probably a deer”  
Freddy nodded and used his axe to cleave a fallen log, just to make sure there weren’t any embers slumbering inside of it. “Yep, or a pig. This county has a huge problem with pigs these days, bastards are everywhere. One did tear up my niece’s inflatable swimming pool three days ago, kid was devastated.”  
Bob just mumbled, that brat was so spoiled it surprised him that she didn’t still get help when she needed her bottom wiped. “Hmm-mm”  
He walked on, the smell got stronger and he slowed down, what the….Ahead there was a small canyon, just a couple of meters deep and not very long but there was something at the bottom, something shiny? Had some bastard dumped his garbage there? Wouldn’t surprise Bob in the least, people would dump just about anything where they shouldn’t. He and the other guys had training as rescue divers and during a training dive they had come across two pick up trucks, a trailer, seven sets of wheels for a tractor and god alone knows how many rusty grills. And the area was a protected zone, part of a national park. So no, nothing did surprise him any more. He got closer. Was that a chair? Yes, an office chair and in it….Bob turned around, suddenly his lunch wanted to say hello to the fresh air again and Freddy tore his helmed and mask off and made a run for the burned bushes. It was a body, strapped to the chair with handcuffs, blackened and twisted and Bob just knew it, this poor son of a bitch had burned alive. Thanks to the funnel effect and the direction of the wind that canyon had acted like a chimney, the heat had to have been infernal! The body seemed to have melted into the chair itself but he did notice one thing before he joined Freddy in the bushes, on the corpse’s finger there was a ring, and it was one he did recognize, all too well.  
\--------------

Bard was fuming, or rather, he wished that he was for it was unbearably hot and if he did lose his temper now he would suffer a heat stroke beyond any doubt. The day had started off with Tilda throwing a fit because she couldn’t find her favourite pair of jeans and heaven forbid she arrived at school in anything else than those goddamn pink pants. Jean had put them into the washing machine and forgotten to remove them the evening before and thus the crisis was a completed fact. Sigrid had managed to calm her sister down by giving her a very nice skirt and Bard had to blink when he saw it for the way he regarded the piece of fabric it did look more like two napkins glued together than a skirt. There wasn’t enough fabric in it to cover a dinner plate, and someone’s ass? Not at all! Then Bain threw a fit since the new puppy Jean had gotten had done unspeakable things to the notebook he just had bought to make sketches in and Legolas couldn’t find his gym bag and Thran managed to slip in the shower and hit his head on the showerhead. Now he had a very nice bruise next to his left eye and was in a foul mood too.  
The shift was to start soon and they drove to work in silence, Thran had an aching head and Bard felt blue, thinking about how fast the kids did grow and how fast they had changed from being completely dependent of him to being on their way to becoming someone he no longer really knew. Thor was not at work this day, he had some vacation left and an officer from another precinct was leading the station in his absence. Mr Green was a nice guy but so easily distracted and he was the type of person who would have forgotten his own head if it hadn’t been attached to his shoulders. Right now he was seemingly trying to imitate a carousel for he was spinning around trying to figure out which phone was ringing and Bard did take a deep breath of air. It was gonna be one of those days, he just knew it. 

Thran had an appointment with the state attorney, he was to do an evaluation of a guy who had murdered his entire family and the attorney knew that most people would prefer to see the guy fry, but still they had to make sure that he actually was aware of his actions. Thran wasn’t looking forwards to it and Bard knew that the case had been bothering his beloved for some weeks. It had been a most horrible murder scene and some said that the man was possessed and that he needed a priest instead of a shrink. Bard had been one of the first detectives called to the scene and he had seen worse but not often. He was writing on a report which was a week overdue when Thran returned, he was sweating and threw his jacket onto his chair, the long golden hair was sticking to his skin and every fan available was working overtime now but it wasn’t enough. The new station didn’t have windows and the air conditioning system wasn’t made for a heatwave like this one. 

Bard moved aside and Thran pulled a chair out and sat down, he was almost panting. “Goddamn it, the prison was even hotter than this place. They are hosing down the inmates with fire hoses to avoid riots, and they are still passing out by the dozen. “ 

Bard nodded. “Yes, the heatwave is said to last out this week!” 

Thran moaned and closed his eyes, the fan on the desk was trying desperately to create some cool air but all it managed to produce was a weak air movement which seemed to be almost ashamed of its own lack of efficiency. “If the temperature rises more now the city will shut down, I kid you not. Nobody has the energy to do anything right now” 

Bard frowned. “So, what is the verdict, is the man to be held responsible for his deeds?” 

Thran sighed and hid his face behind his hands for a second, then he shook his head. “No, the guy is insane, utterly and completely bonkers. I don’t know what his diagnosis is but it is a grand one for sure. He was dead sure I was his late mother, and he wasn’t faking it, he truly has lost all contact with the real world. When I arrived at the interrogation room he was having a very sweet conversation with Eleanor Roosevelt and the warden said that he often spoke to Captain Kirk as well. The dude has a brain which must have been completely fried at some stage.” 

Bard shrugged. “Sounds like it, any idea why?” 

Thran did look uncomfortable. “They think it is a case of drug abuse which has backfired. Some sort of belated effect of youthful experimentation with some shady stuff” 

Bard frowned. “What? He was how old? Fifty four? Can anything affect someone that long after intake?” 

Thran made a grimace. “Well, they say LSD can cause some effects like this but I doubt it, I told the medic at the facility to check the man for syphilis, I am more inclined to believe that the madness is caused by that disease. “ 

Bard cringed. “Syph? Seriously?” 

Thran nodded. “Yes, it can surface after decades and I am quite convinced that the man’s brain looks like Swiss cheese when they scan him. “ 

The door to the main office opened and the face of Mr Green could be seen. “Guys, we have a case, someone has found Mr Lupo Sanchez” 

Bard turned around. “What?! Dead?!” 

Mr Green did look sad. “Of course, they wouldn’t call us if they found him sipping drinks at some spa now would they?” 

Thran cussed. “Goddamn it, I had hoped that he just had decided to take a break” ¨

Mr Green shook his head. “Not much chance for that I am afraid, they found him in the old park, the whole thing had burned to a cinder, and he too I am afraid.” 

Bard got up. “It could not have been an accident?” 

Mr Green shrugged “Not unless he has a hobby of placing himself in the path of a wildfire, chained to an office chair. The CSI are on their way, Judith too. Keep a low profile on this one guys, he is a celebrity after all” 

Bard grasped his badge and gun and Thran did run after him to the cruiser. Bard cussed, the dead man was a national hero, a treasure. A person who had worked his way up from the very bottom of society to become one of the most famous wrestlers ever and he was beloved and admired by everyone. If this was murder it was a tragedy. Thran was staring straight ahead, he did look very intense. “How long has he been missing?” 

Bard pushed the cruiser by a slow moving truck, the GPS was showing them the best route to the old park but the traffic was bad, most people were heading out of the city now, desperate for some shade and relief from the heat. “He was reported missing by his manager last Thursday.” 

Thran swallowed. “Today it is Wednesday, six days then. He must have been kept somewhere, could this be extortion? A kidnapping gone wrong?” 

Bard shook his head. “Nobody has mentioned anything about a ransom, and believe me, if someone did kidnap El Diablo the fans would pay out, no matter how much they wanted.” 

Thran nodded and he did look tense. “Yes, the mayor would have paid too, that man was a saint” 

Bard did focus on the road. “Yes, how much did he spend on charity last year?” 

Thran shrugged. “I have no idea but they say he never gave less than sixty percent of his income to those in need. The city will go into mourning now” 

Bard remembered what he had read about the remarkable career of this wrestler, he had become one of the very icons of the sport and when he had been badly injured in an accident ten years ago everybody feared that this was it, that he would quit. But after several months of rehabilitation he did return to the ring, although he now wore a mask to hide the scars from his injuries. They called him the masked angel and the Latin American population in special seemed to almost worship the man. 

They arrived at the park, the coroner’s car was already there and so were the CSI technicians, sealing off the area and searching for clues. Bard had seen burned areas before, as a kid he had visited some national park just after a major fire and even though the destructions were grand he had been told that it would be green again within a few months. This however was not likely to turn green again, like ever. The soil appeared to have been turned into rock almost and there was a smell in the air there which told Bard that some sort of accelerant had been used. Judith had erected a sort of screen around the body and she nodded at Bard and Thran but her face was grim. Bard had in fact never seen her looking that angry before and she snapped at a poor technician who happened to come too close to her equipment. Bard looked at her with astonishment and she sort of grimaced. “I am sorry, it is just that…this man did so much good for the community, I know of kids who owe him their entire education and many who would have ended on the streets if it wasn’t for Lupo. And now this…” 

Thran swallowed. “Did he suffer?” 

Judith almost snarled. “Suffered? Look at this!”

She help the screen and they saw that the body still was strapped to the remains of the chair, the hands were visible and Bard cringed when he saw that the wrists had been almost severed, the bones broken in several places. “He tried to break free, he fought for his life, seeing how the fire crept closer and closer to him. The one who placed him here knew where the wind and the terrain would turn a fire into an inferno” 

Bard sighed, “It was premeditated” 

Judith nodded. “Hell yeah, and I beg of you, find the one who did this, we cannot let someone who allows something like this to happen run free” 

Thran stared at the charred remains, he did look pale and Bard knew that his partner was thinking very hard right now. “What is on your mind dear?” 

Thran sighed and turned around, there was a hint of sadness in his eyes. “This speaks of strong emotions, or rather extreme ones” 

Bard frowned. “Hatred?” 

Thran shook his head. “No, the one who did this tortured him, but I don’t think he stayed to watch, that would have been too dangerous. No, this speaks of something…more intimate I think, something…deeper” 

Bard was confused. “What?” 

Thran shrugged. “I keep thinking of betrayal, of hurt, heartbreak” 

Bard frowned and stared at the burned remains of the famous wrestler. “I don’t think I understand?” 

Thran let out a huge sigh again. “Neither do I, but we have to interview everybody, what family does he have?” 

Bard had checked the papers when Lupo was reported missing. “His mother lives in a city just over the border, with his siblings. But he had one ex wife and an estranged daughter, and of course a manager and some friends” 

Thran did look curious. “An ex-wife?” 

Bard nodded. “Yes, but I doubt that she is behind this. They separated as friends fifteen years ago and she lives in Canada now, works as a career consultant” 

Thran stood there, staring as Judith did the last preparations and the body was removed from the chair and covered to be transported. He did point towards the street outside of the park area. “Look, the vultures have already gathered” 

Two TV stations did already have reporters on site and they were waiting, looking as eager as a dog who has been promised a big juicy steak. Bard cussed so bad Judith did wince. “Oh damnation and hell fire, this spells trouble” 

He turned to the technicians. “Alright, spill it, who alerted the media?” 

The technicians just shook their heads. “None of us, promise! It could have been one of the fire fighters who found the body though, the reporters pay them to inform them if they do come across something worth writing about” 

Thran pinched the bridge of his nose. “Wonderful, if they do find out who this is the entire police station will be under siege. I bet Thor is happy he is on vacation now but Mr Green won’t be able to handle this, no way!” 

Bard nodded. “It will be like tossing a lame lamb to the wolves. They will tear him to pieces.” 

Thran lifted his cell phone and dialled a number, Bard heard the voice of Elisa, she did sound sleepy. “Yes?” 

Thran winced. “I am sorry to awaken you, but we need you at the station asap, all hell is about to be unleashed complete with brimstone and wailing” 

Elisa could be heard moving. “What? What is happening?” 

Thran cleared his voice. “We have news about the missing wrestler, he is dead, burned to death. And when the media gets a whiff of that the station is gonna become a hornets nest” 

Elisa was silent for a few seconds, then she said something on Navaho which none of them understood but the meaning was pretty obvious. “Right, I will be there in five. Mr Green has never handled the media before, they will smell that and be at his throat” 

Thran ended the call and turned to Bard. “There is nothing more here unless the technicians have found something?” 

The lead technician did look rather important. He was grinning from one ear to the other. “Oh, but we have found something, this was in deed a most diabolic act. He was dozed with gasoline and also some substance we believe is old napalm” 

Bard gaped. “What? Are you kidding?” 

The technician did shake his head, he was a rather chubby guy and Bard tried not to count the number of chins he had. “No, it was smeared all over his clothes, it burns like real hellfire when set alight, it is impossible to put out too” 

Bard did grind his teeth together. “Damn it. Someone wanted to make sure that he wasn’t saved at the last minute, he had to burn!”

Thran nodded. “Like I said, strong emotions!”

Bard cringed and tried not to look at the morticians who carried the corpse to Judith’s car. “What in heck’s name can cause someone to do something like that?” 

Thran sighed. “Know what? I fear that we are about to find out, whether we want to or not” 

They returned to the car and drove off, dispatch sent them to the house where Lupo had lived, some officers were already there to inform his staff of the findings and when Bard pulled into the drive way he was struck by something odd. Lupo had always been a humble man, his home no better than that of most white shirt workers. But there was a very nice car in the driveway, an old Mustang and Bard happened to know that this exact model was very sought after and also expensive as fuck. Had Lupo decided to indulge himself just for once and bought himself something nice?

They entered the rather small but very well kept house, it was a standard home, two floors and three bedrooms with two baths and a small garden and if you didn’t know better you would never have guessed that this was the home of a very wealthy man. Even the furniture was old and worn and the other things there could have been bought at a yard sale for all Bard knew. Nothing was fancy at all. The people assembled was his personal assistant, a house keeper and two of his friends, all had been crying and the house keeper was an elderly woman with flint grey hair and a very bent back. She was rocking back and forth in despair, whispering in Spanish and Bard realized that the woman was truly heartbroken. Thran cleared his throat. “My condolences, I am very sorry for your loss, he was a great man” 

The assistant sniffled. “The greatest, the most warm hearted person ever. Oh what are we to do now? Our light has been extinguished, our hope stolen from us” 

Thran tried to stay serious, the assistant was very melodramatic but he appeared to be one of those gay men who are drama queens. “Have his family been notified?” 

The house keeper nodded. “Yes, his mother is flying in with his sister, they will arrive later today.” 

Bard frowned. “Only two?” 

The grey haired woman nodded slowly. “Yes, he wouldn’t have wanted them to waste money on plane tickets, no, two is enough. They will bring his body back to Mexico when the police is done with it, he is to rest in his home village” 

Thran sat down with a piece of paper and a pen. “Do you know of anyone who would have wanted to harm Lupo? An opponent? A rival perhaps?” 

Everybody shook their heads. The assistant sobbed. “Everybody loved him, yes, everybody. Even those he fought and defeated. Remember the fight against The titan in 06? He paid for The titan’s hospital stay when it was discovered that the man had testicular cancer. And he broke one guys shoulder once but paid all the expenses and then helped him get his kids through college, they are still friends. Everybody adored him” 

Thran frowned. “I have seen the fights, there is a lot of pomp and circumstance, and also a lot of mysteries surrounding El Diablo?” 

The assistant nodded. “Yes, he took his accident and turned it into something positive, something he could use to his benefit. But he was very superstitious like all wrestlers so nobody dared to question his routines” 

Bard felt like a moron, he hadn’t watched that much wrestling at all. “What routines are we talking about?” 

The assistant smiled through the tears. “He would leave his house two hours before the fight and go to the local church where he would pray and confess, nobody were to join him for he needed to focus his energy. He would change into his costume on the way to the fight, and arrive masked and ready and then nobody was to talk to him until the fight was over. “ 

Bard blinked. “Really?” 

The man nodded solemnly. “Yes, he would leave the ring immediately and go to some room designated for him and pray and then he would re-emerge as himself, the El Diablo character left behind. Only then would people be allowed to speak to him” 

Bard stared at Thran who just shrugged. “So, he always did this?” 

The assistant nodded eagerly. “Yes, after the accident. Before that he didn’t really bother but I think he believed that he owed something to God for having survived and the El Diablo character did bother him afterwards but he tried to separate himself from it. He only wore the costume when he was ready to fight, I think he was afraid that El Diablo would influence his true self in some bad manner” 

Bard felt like a moron. “He couldn’t just change the character? Take a new name?” 

The assistant scoffed. “It is very clear that you Mr Detective is no wrestling fan, no wrestler would do that, it is the ultimate bad omen. You can switch side but never the name, ever! It is like swearing whilst at mass” 

Bard couldn’t fall any deeper. “Switch side?” 

Thran sighed and rolled his eyes. “Wrestlers are divided into the good guys and the bad guys, some does create a whole imaginary tale while creating their character, and the fans knows everything about them. It is all a part of the culture and if a good guy becomes a bad guy he may lose some fans but ultimately gain more when he is sort of returned to the herd, it is a grand show” 

Bard shrugged. “I always believed that it was all for show, and that the fights were rigged and not even real” 

The assistant smiled. “Many does believe this yes, but the fights are real, and the damage real too. Lupo has broken almost every bone in his body, only bull riders are more at risk of injury than wrestlers” 

Bard winced. “Don’t they use any sort of protection?” 

The assistant grinned through his tears. “Some, but it won’t save them from the worst of the damage. I have seen broken backs, broken pelvises, broken clavicles, fractured femurs, split kneecaps, ruptured spleens and livers and skull fractures. “ 

Bard swallowed hard. “Goddamn it, and they do this out of their own free will?” 

The assistant nodded. “Yes, and El Diablo was the best, he won eight out of ten fights, and always has” 

Thran smiled. “The best wrestlers become icons, and make millions. Unfortunately there has been many deaths and not all are able to handle the fame well” 

The assistant nodded slowly. “Yes, last year we lost two wrestlers, The yeti and Scorpion, The Yeti ate a bullet and Scorpion died of heart failure, he used a lot of steroids earlier and that shit does mess you up for life” 

Bard swallowed hard. “I heard of that case, the guy did look like a bloody bull, bulging muscles everywhere” 

The assistant made a grimace. “Yes, they ruin their bodies that way, these day some inject themselves with silicon or even food oil to look bigger, but let me tell you, the morticians have a hell of a job with them afterwards” 

Thran scoffed and Bard winced, silicon? Cooking oil? Sweet Jesus!  
The housekeeper stood there with her arms across her chest. “Lupo tried to end that trend, he was always trying to lead the young talents onto the right path but he didn’t always have success, some tried to take the easy way no matter what. But they never lasted very long, a human body can only take so much” 

Bard nodded. “So Lupo used the gym a lot I bet?” 

He took a peek at a picture hung above the mantel piece, it showed Lupo as a rather young man standing next to his manager. Damn it, he had been taller than Thran, and the physique was nothing less than perfection. The assistant nodded. “He had his own gym, he didn’t let anyone else in when he was training, he was pretty eccentric when it came to El Diablo” 

Bard nodded. “So I have understood!”

Thran got up. “So you cannot think of anyone holding a grudge against him? What about the street gangs? I am pretty sure he did make them lose some members?” 

The housekeeper shook her head. “No, they wouldn’t have touched a hair on Lupo’s head, they looked up to him as well. No, the only one capable of killing our Lupo would be the devil himself!”

Thran smiled, a sad smile. “It would seem so yes.” 

Bard sighed. “We have to talk to his manager, do you know where he is?” 

The assistant nodded. “At the office down town, by the training halls. He is always there. He did take the news…he didn’t react well” 

Thran put a hand on Bard’s shoulder. “Let’s go, maybe he can shed some light on this” 

They left the house in silence, it was obvious that everybody who had worked with Lupo were very loyal and dedicated and their respect for the man only increased. The training halls were placed in what used to be an industrial hall and it was transformed to a very nice facility for sports of different sorts. Most of the people they saw there were youths and Bard did see that some did walk by wearing fencing gear. They entered and saw several rings, some were training boxing while others were being taught what had to be karate by a small man with a very eastern appearance. Here there were no dirty floors, no spit buckets or even the smell of sweat, the place was clean, well ventilated and the colours were nice too. There was a row of offices at the back of the huge room and they were heading in that direction when a young man stopped them. He was wearing a training suit and wrist protection and he was rather grey in the face. “Please, tell us it isn’t true, Lupo cannot be dead?!” 

Bard felt guilty as he sighed and answered. “I am sorry kid, but it is. He is gone” 

The boy started to sob and Thran tilted his head. “You were among his admirers?” 

The boy nodded and swallowed. “Yes, an apprentice. If Lupo hadn’t decided to help me I would have ended up on the street for sure, my family are damn poor and the neighbourhood the worst one. He gave me a future man” 

Bard nodded. “I guess that this goes for almost everybody here?” 

The boy nodded. “Yes, but everybody is welcome you know, we have some west enders here too, rich kids. But everyone is treated as equals, Lupo was very adamant about that. Race and religion or wealth matters not, only talent and will” 

Bard saw that the people training had noticed them and some started to cry while a few of the girls there wailed, the teachers seemed to be in shock too. Bard grasped Thran and almost ran to the offices, only one was occupied by a huge fat guy who was sitting there weeping like a four year old who has lost a favourite toy. The man saw them and gestured for them to enter, he was red eyed and his hands were shaking almost violently. Bard remembered that Mr Beauville had been a very good boxer in his youth but an early onset of Parkinson’s disease had ended his career. Now the man was trembling like a leaf but he was the best when it came to finding new talents and making them fulfil their full potential. Strict but fair was the words which were most used when he was described and Thran bowed his head. “We are extremely sorry for your loss” 

The man sniffed. “Please sit down, and my name is Frederic by the way. Did…did he suffer?” 

The voice was shivering at the end and Bard realized that this place was one where everybody were considered as family. Thran swallowed. “Uhm, well…”

Frederic let out a keening sound and hid his face within his hands. “Oh Jesus, who did this to him? Who could be so…cruel?!” 

Bard tried to look professional. “We intend to find out, do you know of anyone who held a grudge against him? Anything?” 

The manager shook his head. “No, Lupo was planning on retiring you know, he isn’t young anymore and well, a life in the ring does take its toll of you, it doesn’t leave you with many choices whence you turn fifty, that is for darn sure.” 

Thran did look intense all of a sudden. “Was this common knowledge?” 

Frederic nodded. “Yes, he was planning on a last tour, the biggest shows you know, just to end it all with a boom” 

Thran frowned. “They say he lost a few fights lately?”  
Frederic nodded. “Yes, three in fact, some say he should have retired last year, that he isn’t strong enough but I think those losses were just bad luck. The referees were young and inexperienced and his opponents some brute savages who should have been banned from entering a ring, there are rules you see and they broke them all, behind the referees back.” 

Thran’s eyes had gotten narrow. “So, he lost three fights, but he won the next ones?” 

Frederic nodded. “Oh yes, in his usual grand style. He has invented most of the jargon of this business, most of the most spectacular moves are his invention.” 

Thran did look as if he was thinking about something. “I know, I have watched some of his shows, they are always entertaining” 

Frederic managed to smile. “Yes, some of the guys lack all creativity, they are just here to fight and earn money and we have to invent their character and their appearance and everything. But Lupo did it all on his own, he even sewed his own costumes. The man was unique” 

Bard wetted his lips. “So, how much did he earn, for a show I mean?” 

Frederic shrugged. “He would never charge less than eight hundred grand if the show was one of the big national ones, the ones which are being aired on TV. Small local shows? Depended on the number of spectators and the ticket price. I know he did a small show in some desolate town in the cascades four years ago for free, just to show people what it was all about. He kicked the ass of all the local bullies, apparently the town had lived under their heel for quite a while but he did whop their asses with grandeur, one of the guys ended at the local hospital with two broken clavicles and a fractured pelvis. Apparently he was known for beating women and children” 

Thran cringed. “Injuries which are hard to heal and extremely painful” 

Frederic nodded. “And well deserved. Lupo didn’t accept violence against the innocent, no. he would fight for the weak with his own life and all his power” 

Bard did look outside, a huge guy with long auburn hair and a rather fierce visage had stopped outside of the door, he did look distraught. “May I come inn?” 

Frederic did look up. “Yes, of course. Detectives, this is Snakebite, aka Leslie Carlsen, he is one of the guys who fought Lupo quite often” 

Leslie gulped and it was odd to see such a scary guy being close to tears, the man was covered with tattoos and he had some nasty scars. “I cannot believe it, oh man, Lupo…Lupo ought to live forever, he was…a saint!”

Thran nodded. “Yes, you fought him?” 

The huge wrestler nodded. “I did, many times. He fought fair man, always. Losing against him was no shame, more like an honour.” 

Bard frowned. “How did he win so often if he didn’t use tricks?” 

Leslie smiled. “He was strong as fuck, and agile too, a freak of nature. Well, he did of course lose some of it after the accident and had to drop some of his best moves and he didn’t fight quite as clean as before but after all, he didn’t use dirty tricks.” 

Bard sort of grimaced. “I don’t really know that much about the accident, could you explain it to me?” 

Frederic nodded. “Yes, he was out with a friend one night, they had been off fishing in the bay and were towing their boat and as they crossed an intersection a drunk driver T boned the truck, the other guy died on the spot but Lupo got many fractures and also some ghastly burns. That was when he started using the mask all the time when he was in character. He didn’t want to scare kids and women on the stands” 

Thran smiled. “I see, it became his signature so to speak. But it was very unexpected that he was able to return to the ring at all wasn’t it?” 

Frederic nodded. “Oh yes, we never expected to see him fight again but he did, even if his body was battered and injured. You should see him after each fight when he had changed and gotten out of character, he was barely able to move at times. But he always gave his all while in the ring, always! He never spared himself for too many did rely on him.”

Bard remembered something. “He did pay for an entire school?” 

Frederic did look proud. “Oh yes, he did build a school in one of the worst areas of the city, the one the authorities did run there didn’t do anything except educate villains and crooks. But his school? They have been on the top of the list of A students for ten years now, and these are kids from poor families, kids who would have been expected to fail if they had been going to the other school.” 

Thran sighed. “He had seen what poverty could do to someone, because he had been poor too” 

Frederic nodded. “Indeed, he wanted to spare others from that fate” 

Thran tilted his head. “We have visited his home and couldn’t help but notice that there was a very nice car in the driveway? Has he decided to enjoy some of his money after all?”

Frederic did look puzzled. “No? That cannot be Lupo’s, he always drove an old van, a wreck really but it was cheap and easy to drive and he had bought it when he was starting his career” 

Bard sighed. “Alright, we will look into that, the van has to be somewhere.” 

Thran got up. “We will be in touch, and if you remember having seen or heard something odd do not hesitate, we would love to hear about it” 

Frederic and Leslie did nod and both did look very sad now, Bard winced. If these men reacted thus then what about the rest of the city? They only had to venture outside to find the answer to that question, everywhere people were gathering and someone had placed a sort of shrine by the wall of the hall. Pictures, action figures and posters were placed there with burning candles, incense and what looked like offerings. Bard felt shaken, the man had truly become a sort of God to these people.  
Thran did look stressed out. “Hurry, there is something I need to do” 

Bard frowned. “What?” 

Thran didn’t even turn his head to look at Bard. “I think I am onto something but I may be wrong, it could be my own memory which tricks me” 

Bard did start the cruiser and they drove back to the station with Thran constantly fidgeting with his sleeves and hair, he did look very agitated or nervous. He raced into the station and flung himself down in front of the computer, he turned it on and Bard saw that Thran entered Youtube, and searched for El Diablo. “What is it?” 

Thran bit his lower lip. “Listen, the TV stations sends professional recordings, but they never capture everything. But cell phones are legal and many do tape the shows, I think I saw an amateur shot once which made me a bit confused. “ 

Bard sat down. “Confused?” 

Thran was scrolling down the long list of video’s. “Yes, oh yes, here, look at this” 

Bard was staring at the image of the ring, El Diablo was covered with a black suit and he wore a mask and a cloak, his face was completely covered and the other man was dressed in red and he wore a sort of fur collar which made him look slightly lion like. El Diablo did evade a very nasty attack and threw his opponent onto the floor so hard they saw it give way. “That is his signature move, a sort of throw nobody else were able to do. But yes, I was right, there is something strange here” 

Bard was getting very confused now, and frustrated. “For the love of God Thran, what is this about” 

Thran raised a hand. “Wait a moment, just…wait! 

He found another video and opened it in a new tab, then he started staring at the two video’s, back and forth and his eyes were narrow. Bard didn’t see anything odd about it at all, they did look almost identical to his untrained eye. Wrestling had never been his favourite.  
Thran was scrolling again, opening more videos and Bard did realize that they did span the entire career of the man known as El Diablo. The shrink was obviously looking for something specific and he was working fast and with obvious determination, whispering something between his teeth as he scrolled and compared and opened more tabs. One of the others there shouted. “Hey. Thran, you are stealing the entire bandwidth here, what the fuck are you doing over there? Downloading the entire internet?”

Thran sent the man a wry grin. “Only the porn” 

The other man shook his head. “Like I said, the entire net!”

Bard was curious too and then Thran suddenly froze and enhanced the video he was watching, he was almost pressing his nose against the screen and then he swore, with a very low voice. “Goddamn it, I knew it, I just knew it” 

Bard was ready to tear his hair out. “You knew what?!”

Thran pointed at the screen. “Lupo and El Diablo aren’t the same person” 

Bard blinked. “Ah, what?!” 

Thran was wide eyed, “Look, after the accident? Look at that move!”

Bard looked, he saw the masked man lifting his opponent and sort of spinning him around before tossing him at the ropes like a marionette. “Yes?” 

Thran was rolling his eyes. “And now, before the accident” 

He started another video and Bard saw the exact same thing, El Diablo lifted the opponent, spun him around like a helicopter and then tossed him into the ropes. “Uh, I don’t see…Oh fuck!”

Bard stared at Thran who stared back. “You saw right?”

Bard nodded. “Yes, he switched direction of the spin, from clockwise to counter clock wise” 

Thran’s voice was low. “No wrestler just changes a move like that, you use your dominant hand to control the spin, Lupo was right handed, this man…” He pointed at the first video” Is left handed”

Bard couldn’t believe it. “But…” 

Thran did look confused and also eager. “After the accident someone else fought as El Diablo, I am darn sure of it” 

Bard was about to ask if Thran could prove it when the phone rang, they heard Judith’s voice. “Guys, get down here now, I have news, I cannot believe it but…”

Thran was grinning like mad man. “Lupo isn’t Lupo right?” 

Judith was silent for a second, then they heard her voice, very intense. “How in the name of holy fucking hell do you know? Are you a freaking psychic?!”

Thran giggled. “No, just a sports fanatic. We’ll be there”

Bard stared at Thran. “But…everybody must have seen it? His manager, his friends? He was superstitious damn it” 

Thran was already heading for the door. “He had been in an accident remember? They worshiped him, if he said he had retrained himself to use his left arm instead of his right one they would believe him, hell, I bet he could have convinced them that he was the second coming of Christ” 

They entered the morgue and Bard hissed, down there the temperature was chill as always and it felt like a shock after having endured the heat for so long. Judith stood by the autopsy table and she was still a bit shaken, her eyes large and she stared at Thran, “You better answer how you came to that conclusion, before I did” 

Thran smiled, a wide grin which showed all his perfect teeth. “ It was easy, he changed his fighting style after the accident, and fighters never do that. It is a bad omen they believe”  
Judith scoffed. “Jocks, I cannot believe you guys!”

She moved the sheet away from the corpse on the table. “Well, here he is, whoever he is” 

Bard cringed, the scorched body was almost skeletal and Thran turned away, slightly green. The smell of burned flesh was suddenly overwhelming. “So, what have you found?” 

Judith grinned. “Oh, I have found a lot you see, this guy was twenty years younger than Lupo, very similar to him in build but half an inch shorter, even without the partial cremation. He had some old injuries but none too serious and he was very healthy, a perfect specimen”

Thran nodded. “The difference in height could be blamed on the accident. Anything which can identity him?” 

Judith nodded and pointed at the man’s exposed mouth, the gums were pulled back in a sneer. “Here, he had a tooth with a tiny diamond in it, a very nice job so either it was a gift or he was loaded” 

Thran was frowning. “The car, it was his, I bet” 

Bard looked at Thran, his eyes were almost pleading. “Then who killed this man? And why?” 

Thran straightened himself up. “Know what? I bet Lupo is alive, and our killer!” 

Bard gasped. “What?!”

Thran grasped Bard by the sleeve. “Follow me, there is something I need to check, we need Elisa and her buddy for this” 

They ran upstairs again and found Elisa trying to convince a gang of very rude reporters of the importance of being discrete. They didn’t listen so Thran grasped his lighter and since he was very tall it was no problem holding the flame near one of the fire detectors, thus setting off the sprinklers in that room. The journalists were crying bloody murder since their equipment didn’t like getting wet and Thran did just stand there, with a diabolic smirk on his face. Elisa raised an eyebrow but didn’t protest, instead there was a hint of a smile on her face. Thran dragged her with him to the office and had her sit down by the computer. “Listen, we need you to contact that hacker of yours, Erestor. We need his help” 

Elisa frowned. “Alright, but what exactly is this about?” 

Thran sat down too and his face was intense. “Listen, That body down there isn’t Lupo, but he has to be somewhere right? Try to find out if he owns anything anywhere, like a house or a cabin or just somewhere he could hide” 

Elisa did look shocked but did log inn and before long she was chatting with her friend, he was obviously busy for they heard him typing like mad and several sounds did indicate that he entered different sites. “No, nothing is registered in his name” 

Thran was thinking hard “Try another name, try Mariella Saint Le Crux, that is his mother’s maiden name” 

There was typing and they heard Erestor’s smooth voice, “We have a Mariella Dutch?” 

Thran slammed his hand into the table. “His ex wife’s last name and his mother’s first name, yes, try that one” 

There was frantic work being done and suddenly they heard a pling. “Eureka, I have it!” 

Erestor did sound very excited. “There is a small cabin registered to this person, near Gachichalla lake. It is very remote” 

Elisa blinked and her eyes were huge. “That is tribal land, they won’t let outsiders inn?” 

Thran smiled. “Oh I bet they would make an exception for Lupo” 

Bard swallowed. “So, what do we do? I mean, we don’t know he is the killer for sure, and he could be anywhere really” 

Thran sighed. “Bard, have faith. I do believe that this man is by that lake, and yes, he did kill that other guy. I am sure of it. The murder spoke of feelings remember, intense ones. You don’t just go ahead and kill some guy like that if you are indifferent, no, it was personal and if Mr Crisp downstairs did play the role of El Diablo for Lupo he was close to the guy, very close!”

Bard nodded but insecurity was still visible within his eyes. “But damn it, we need to identify the guy, he has family somewhere, they need to know the truth” 

Thran nodded. “Yes, I know, but we do need to find Lupo too, I have a bad feeling about this” 

He turned to Elisa. “You know the right people, can you get us to the lake?” 

Elisa grasped her phone. “Yes, my dad and the reservation sheriff are buddies, it should be a piece of cake” 

She went to make the call and Bard stared at Thran. “But the cadaver downstairs?” 

Thran shrugged. “What about it?” 

Bard was almost foaming by now. “He had to be a wrestler too, I mean, how long was El Diablo gone after the accident? I bet he wasn’t out of the spotlight long enough to train someone from scratch now was he?” 

Thran froze. “Bard, you are a genius, I love you!”

Bard did bristle a bit. “I know!” 

Thran threw himself over the computer and started searching and he did appear to know what he was looking for, after just five minutes he was tapping at the screen. “Here, this is our guy, take a look at him”

Bard did and gaped. “Oh sweet Bjeezes, he looks…” 

Thran was beaming. “Like he was a clone of a younger version of Lupo right?” 

Bard nodded. “So, what’s the story?” 

Thran opened a new tab. “Say hello to Mr Gonzales Right, born in Texas with immigrant parents, was a promising football player until he injured a knee and lost his scholarship. Was trying a new career as a body builder for a few years until he suddenly disappeared off the radar completely” 

Bard nodded. “Lupo caught wind of him and saw his potential, and then he found the perfect man to take his mask and wear it” 

Thran closed the tabs. “He has a mother alive, and three siblings but they don’t have contact, apparently his mother wanted him to become a doctor or lawyer or something like that, brainy and well paid. But Gonzales was more brawls than brains unfortunately”

Bard grinned. “No shit, but he did a good job though, nobody suspected anything” 

Thran wrote something on a note and handed it over to one of the other officers there. “We are going to get Lupo, give this to Mr Green. He can call Gonzales mother, he is the right sort of type for that kind of calls, he may cry a bit. “ 

Bard could just tag along, Elisa came running from her office, waving her phone. “It is fixed, the sheriff is waiting for us, he will take us to the cabin”

Thran grinned and grasped a few bottles of water from a cooler. “Here, it is a long drive, and a hot one for sure” 

Bard was happy the cruiser had air condition for damn, the temperature outside was horrible now and even the road work outside of town had seized. They did drive rather fast, having a police car was sometimes a huge advantage but Bard felt a hard lump in his gut the whole way. What was this really about? Had this seemingly saint like man gone bonkers and just killed his look alike? The reservation wasn’t a large one, the tribe there did hold onto their own culture and didn’t really like intruders but the sheriff did seem like a nice guy. He presented himself as Willy Roundtree and they got into his pick up since the roads were less like roads and more like cattle tracks when they got to the lake area. The cruiser wouldn’t stand a chance against the mud, potholes and washboards. The pickup was a huge one with room for many people and it had a distinct scent of cat pee and dog food. Mr Roundtree was chatting away with Elisa the whole way, his cousin was about to get married and they had to gather all sorts of stuff for the ceremony and they had huge problems finding the right things without going bankrupt. 

Thran was tense and so was Bard, the cabin was placed on a sort of peninsula, and the place was idyllic, and very lovely with huge fir trees, meadows and grazing deer. It did look like a piece of heaven and Bard did understand why anyone would want a cabin there, it did look like a peaceful spot. There was an old van parked outside of the cabin, the keys were in the ignition and Mr Roundtree grasped his gun and left the pick up. “Mr? Lupo? It is me, the sheriff?” 

No answer, they all walked over to the house and the door was unlocked. Inside was a very nice room which was dominated by a hearth and some old carved furniture. There were no personal belongings to be seen and the kitchen equipment hadn’t been touched at all. Bard just knew it, this was not good. Elisa peeked out of the back window and yelped. “Oh God!”

They raced out the back door, there was a huge old oak behind the cabin, with branches spreading out wide. Something was dangling from one of them and it was white and moving with the breeze. Thran swallowed hard and Mr Roundtree swore. “Oh by the ancestors, I was afraid of that” 

The man who had called himself El Diablo to attract the crowd had hanged himself, he was wearing a long white robe and he had a piece of cardboard attached to the front of it, huge letters were written onto it. “Diabolus fecit, ut id faecerem ei. Quae mea culpa. Judas”

Thran’s voice was dry as he read it out loud and Elisa translated with a very odd voice. “The devil made me do it, all is my fault. Judas” 

Bard sighed. “We were too late, we’ll never know why now!” 

Thran pointed towards the ground underneath the tree. “No, I think he has left us something” 

There was a video cassette placed on top of a stone and a note laid on it, saying. “For whom it may concern” 

Mr Roundtree cleared his voice. “He does look peaceful, almost…I don’t know, satisfied?” 

Elisa nodded. “Yes, there was a TV inside of the cabin, let us see what this is” 

They went inside after the sheriff called the local coroner and his staff and then they put the cassette into the old VCR player. A shivering image did appear and they recognized Lupo right away, he did look very sad. “Hello, by now you will have noticed my absence, many may wonder where I am, or why I am missing. I will try to answer all questions but first I have a confession to make, a terrible one. For the last years I have fooled everybody, I have betrayed the love and trust you have shown me and I am so very sorry. But I did it with the best of intentions. After my accident I thought my career was ruined, and my heart was broken for how could I now earn money for my friends, for my family, for everybody who depended upon me?” 

The image showed a picture of the young man who became the new El Diablo. “Then I found this young man, so like me, so much so that I knew it was a sign from God. He was willing and for years he did step into the ring as me, and he did play the role very well. The changes in fighting style was blamed on my injuries and everybody did believe that he was me when he was in the ring. He was such a good young man, a person I loved like a son, like I love my own family.” 

The image changed again, a picture from one of the fights. “Then I realized that something was wrong, he lost when he shouldn’t have, and he did confess to having been persuaded into losing, to have been paid to go down. I was furious but he swore that it never would happen again, and I believed him. He was young, young men do mistakes, I know that from my own experience. Who was I to judge him?” 

The image showed just Lupo again. “But things changed, I got older, I had a hard time staying fit enough for the charade to go on. I decided to retire and that was when…” 

The voice broke a few times, he was obviously crying. “He went mad when I told him that I was gonna quit, that he no longer would be able to play the role. That El Diablo had to die.” 

Lupo was heaving for air. “He said mean things, terrible things and then he left. I felt guilty but I was sure he would see that I was right after a while, that he would return to common sense.” 

He was staring straight at the camera. “I have dedicated my life to helping others, to pave the way for the greatness of others, to help them become more than before. I have used very little on my own person, only the bare necessities. I have given it all away, and I gave Gonzales a good share of the money too. He was grateful, happy. He was glad to help others and gave some money away too, we were of the same mind.”

He looked down and Thran was staring at the screen as if he was transfixed. “He didn’t come back, and when I was paying some bills I realized that money was missing from one of the accounts. Several millions. At first I believed that it was a mistake, those money were supposed to go to an orphanage at the village where I was born. Then I realized that Gonzales had taken it all, and I have never felt such heartache, such loss. I trusted him, I would have left him with a legacy any man would be proud to honour but he turned around and spat in my face, in our believes and hopes. In everything I were. I hired a private investigator, Gonzales were spending the money, on drugs, whores, crime. I just knew it. El Diablo had to die, and this time for real”

Thran mumbled. “I was right, heartbreak and disappointment” 

Lupo wiped tears of his face. “I called him, left a message, said I would return to Mexico and leave the house to him but he had to sign the papers, could we meet? He agreed and we met, I spiked his drink with a strong painkiller, then I drove him off to the old park and chained him to a chair before I made sure that he would burn, I had gasoline in the truck and some old army stuff some friend had left at my house because he couldn’t pay to get rid of it since it was dangerous waste. And he did burn, he burned just as he will when the devil is tormenting him in hell. I guess I am going that way too, but at least I have done something good with my life, that ought to count for something right?”

He help up some rope. “Tell mama I am sorry, but I have killed a man in a most horrible manner, a man who was like a son to me. But I am no Jesus, I couldn’t turn the other cheek when he robbed so many innocent children of a better future. I guess El Diablo got the better of me in the end, he was too much of an influence, I guess that goes for us both. I am not asking for forgiveness, he betrayed us all, but pray for my wretched soul. I am no better than Judas so his fate will be mine, minus the thirty gold coins that is. I was known as the devil, maybe they will remember me with some kindness, that is all for which I can hope. God be with you, and may he have mercy on my soul. My will is in my office, everything had been taken care off. This is the final goodbye of El Diablo. “

The screen went black and everybody stared at each other, Elisa’s lower lip was trembling and Mr Roundtree was wild eyed. Thran did look almost content. “I guessed it, he must have felt so betrayed, so…disappointed in Gonzales. It made him lose it, completely” 

Bard shuddered. “But dozing a man with gasoline and napalm and then setting him on fire? That is very extreme” 

Elisa nodded. “Yes, but remember that these were men who embraced everything extreme, they lived life to the full, became symbols. It was so very symbolic, terrible yes, but with a certain grotesque justice to it. Gonzales had stolen from the poor, to Lupo I guess that was the ultimate crime” 

Mr Roundtree nodded. “It was, he was so afraid that something would happen which would stain his name and reputation, it meant everything to him. His name was his key to eternity and when Gonzales did what he did he threatened that. Lupo would rather die than be remembered as someone who just took it all and left others with nothing. If Gonzales had been allowed to continue he would have done just that.”

Bard sighed. “The things we do for a decent reputation” 

Thran nodded. “Oh yes, but now El Diablo is truly dead, and his mother will get a body to bury which is if I may be so morbid, way better looking than initially believed.”

Bard punched his shoulder. “Thran, you are truly macabre, geez!” 

The site was overtaken by the local police and the three did return to the city to find out that Gonzales mother refused to come to claim her son’s body. Apparently she had found out what he had been up to and was too ashamed to even bother. So his body would just be buried in a very anonymous grave on the local cemetery. Mr Green was happy the case had solved itself so fast for he had media breathing down his neck all the time and they did return in time to find him yelling into the phone. “NO! he wasn’t possessed by the devil you twat, if you write that I will sue your paper back to before the days of Gutenberg, do you hear? Good! Shut up and wait like everybody else!”

He slammed the phone down and he was red faced and his eyes were bulging. Thran snickered. “My oh my, looks like Mr Green does have a temper after all” 

Bard nodded. “Who would have known, but I bet he cannot wait to return to his own station, the worst things which happens there are cats which are stuck in trees and missing mail” 

Both grinned and Elisa patted them both on the back. “Good work guys, at least we know there isn’t some wrestler killing serial killer out there. But it was a tragedy from the start!” 

Bard nodded. “You are right, it was. A noble man who tried to overcome a tragic event, only to have his very identity threatened. It is almost like some Greek tragedy” 

Thran smiled. “Yes, but I know one thing which isn’t tragic, we are at the end of our shift, the case is solved and the kids are waiting, ready for the beach, so shall we?” 

Bard had to smile again. “Yes, let’s. Right away, before they find more charred corpses. The afternoon shift can deal with them.” 

Three days later the body of Lupo was transported to his family and the ceremony was so grand the military was commandeered out to control the masses. Thousands did show up to see the funeral and show their last respects and many did sign a list which asked for him to be granted sainthood. It was doubtful that the Vatican would make a saint out of a murderer but people didn’t really bother with that fact, he had tried to protect his honour and name and to their culture that was an honourable deed, no matter what. A huge mausoleum was erected and the fortune he did leave was contributed to the poor within the area. Each day many would come to pray by the tomb, hoping that the devil who was an angel would listen and take pity with them and when Thran heard about this he just grinned and said that Lupo, wherever he was, probably listened to them all and did his outmost to help, in death as he had in life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I dont know diddely squat about wrestling, and any similarity to real people is purely coincidential- Sorry about the long wait but i have had surgery in my left hand and thus writing has been sloooooowwwww lately.


	8. Radioactive

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Judith has a sad case to take care of and Bard and Thran were supposed to have the day off but no rest for them after all...

Chapter 8: Radioactive

 

This was the part of the job which Judith hated, with a vengeance. Having a young person laying there on her table, a human being who had barely had the time to live at all, to fully explore this mortal life. She sighed and washed her hands, the body was brought there earlier that morning by ambulance and this was a routine autopsy. The cause of death was already declared to be suicide and Judith did never start off doubting the conclusions made by the emergency workers. Apparently this girl had been found by her mother this very morning, laying in bed, already stiff and cold with bloody froth around the mouth.   
Judith knew the pressure some young were under, this girl was going to a very prestigious high school, she had parents with both status and power and she was expected to excel in her every task. Judith had seen it all before, how it became simply too much in the end, a teenager doesn’t have the mental strength yet to deal with it all. And the last years had most certainly seen a very worrisome trend arising, the frequent use of smart phones and social media had triggered a veritable avalanche of cases like this. Judith hoped that this wasn’t such a case, she had encountered a few and they were always horrible. One boy she had examined had hanged himself because he had been bullied every day, he had received horrible text messages almost every hour and in the end it became too much.   
This girl was just fifteen years old, she was a cheerleader, had a bright future ahead of her and came from a family where money never was a problem. Judith wished that she could say the same, her parents had been rather poor but this kid had a cosmetic surgeon and a high end lawyer as parents and Judith knew that she had to do this job as well as possible. They wouldn’t want their beloved daughter back looking like she had been butchered. Judith preferred to do these jobs alone, she didn’t think that her assistant treated the deceased with the right amount of respect. She turned the huge lamps around and got started, recording everything as she went along. The body was that of a girl in good shape, not too skinny nor overweight and she was free from any signs of abuse or violence. The mother had found a box on the floor, it had contained some very strong pain killers and Judith wondered where the kid had managed to get a hold of them, and why she had taken them. Desperation can force people into doing things which are very untypical of them and she had seen more horrible suicides than this one but something here just didn’t feel right.   
Judith trusted her guts, she always had and it had never failed her. She looked at the dead body, the girl was pretty, with long dark blonde hair, gorgeous green eyes and a good complexion, she wasn’t the type of a person to be bullied, she looked like one of the popular girls, one of the winners. So why had she ended herself? Judith couldn’t see why she should have chosen such a tragic course of actions. She started going through the internal organs, everything seemed fine until she got to the lower abdomen, there Judith suddenly stopped and her eyes got wider, she bit her lower lip and bent over the body, her gloved hand did carefully examine the exposed organ and there was no doubt. “ Oh fuck, now this changes the whole game now doesn’t it little one?”   
She turned off the recorder, closed her eyes. A game changer indeed, the girl had been pregnant and judging from the size of the womb she had been at least three months on the way, was this the cause of her terrible decision? Judith felt a chill running down her spine, she grasped a vial of blood and ran over to the lab, this had to be checked out, asap. She had a terrible suspicion.   
\---------------------------  
Bard was trying not to make too much noise, his husband had snaked his way down beneath the covers and right now a very devious tongue was doing incredibly naughty things to Bard’s inner thighs. The kids were at school and Jean was out training some colts so they had the house to themselves and as soon as they were alone they had stormed up the stairs and into the bedroom, throwing off their clothes like they were on fire. Bard gasped and squirmed and strong hands immediately grasped a hold off his hips and prevented him from moving. Thran had had just that devilish glimpse within his azure eyes, the one which sent Bard’s heart racing and made his legs feel like jelly. He had teased Bard the entire morning and it made the dark haired man almost mad with anticipation, Thran was such a tease and knew just what buttons to push to make Bard tremble with withheld desire.   
They had the day off, the previous week they had taken some extra hours for the investigators who worked the night shift and now they returned the favour, and it was very needed. They had worked hard lately, Bard had been busy with some gang related murders and Thran had tried to teach two classes of police students about profiling. Too bad most of them couldn’t separate between a nun and a serial killer, he was firmly believing that the students this year were Darwin awards candidates, and Bard tended to agree. Some of them were just daft. Thran was moving inn for the final part of this performance and Bard was seeing stars, he arched off the bed, body trembling. Then a shrill sound penetrated the silence of the bedroom, an insisting and very annoying version of Despacito played on a recorder. Bard hated that ringtone, now more than ever! Thran didn’t stop doing what he was doing at all and Bard rolled his eyes, the phone was well outside of his reach and Thran wouldn’t let him go at all. “Fuck…Oh…AAHHH, goddamn it…” 

Thran grinned and let go, lifting his head. “Let it ring, it is our day off!”

Bard was trembling through the last stages of his orgasm and the phone kept ringing, it was their boss, only he had been stored on the phone with that ringtone. Bard rolled to his side, reaching the phone and pushing the button, Thran did look annoyed. “I told you it can wait!”

Bard shook his head. “Ah…Hello?” 

Thor’s voice was a bit distant. “It is me, why do you sound like a freakin’ duck? You aren’t coming down with a cold now are you?” 

Thran snickered. “No, just coming” 

Thor could be heard scoffing. “Jeezes, the two of you…I am sorry to disturb your whatever it is you are doing, I really don’t want to know the details, but we need you here” 

Bard groaned, in a way less pleased manner than just seconds ago. “Damn it, we were supposed to have the day off?” 

Thor was moving about, the reception got better. “Yeah, I know, but we have a murder, and it is a nasty one and the others are in over their elbows with a hit and run downtown. Some bastard drove an SUV into a parade” 

Bard laid back, groaning yet again and Thran took the phone. “Alright, where?” 

Thor did sound tired. “Masonstreet number 84, it is close to…” 

Thran interrupted. “The old city hall, I know. We are on our way in five” 

Thor almost growled. “You’d better, this is a high end area, we cannot afford any fuck ups this time!”

He did hang up and Thran smacked Bard over the rear. “Damn it, I haven’t gotten there yet but duty calls. You can return the favour tonight” 

Bard got up, his legs were trembling and he felt sticky all over. “I need a shower” 

Thran nodded. “Yep, you reek, but make it very fast, I know the tone of voice Thor used and I bet we are in for a real treat. He never sounds that shaken unless it is something very epic” 

Bard scooted into the bathroom, he did finish the shower in two minutes, a new personal record and then he got dressed. Thran did look impeccable as always, just some strokes with a brush and some fresh clothes and he would look as if he had come from a formal meeting just minutes ago. Bard growled to himself as they ran to the car, he had barely time to leave a note for Jean and Thran took the wheel. “I know the house, it belongs to one of the richest men in this country” 

Bard buckled inn, Thran could sometimes drive as if he was still on a racing course. “Really?”

He wasn’t really that interested but Thran grinned. “Mr Bilbo Baggins, one of the founding fathers of this city, or rather, its wealth. He is one hundred and eleven years old now, but still going strong.” 

Bard got a bit interested after all, that old? The man had to be something special indeed. “How did he get so rich?” 

Thran pushed the car to the limit, there wasn’t that much traffic on the freeway at this time of the day and he swerved around the few cars they did catch up with like an expert. “Believe it or not, he made his first fortune selling gardening equipment during WW2. It was in high demand and then he went over to the US and started making machines for farms. Now his firm sells and manufacture everything from tractors to fertilizer and they even design gardens for people. All you have to do is call, they do the rest.”   
Bard swallowed. No wonder the guy was rich then, he had seen some advertisements for designer gardens and the cost had made him rear back in shock, you could buy several houses for the value of just one garden like that. The house was one of the largest in the city, old but very well taken care off and it did look like a fortress. There were several police cars there and Thor stood outside, smoking and looking pale. “So, there you are, what kept you for so long?” 

Neither of them said anything, Bard just sent his boss a sheepish grin and Thran cocked his head. “So, who is murdered? I hope it isn’t the old man himself?” 

Thor shook his head. “No, it is one of the staff here, a fellow known as Mr Jacques LaRue.” 

Thran did smack his tongue. “Oh my, the famous chef?” 

Thor nodded. “Yes, but it was a burglary turned murder we think” 

Bard could imagine that such a grand house would contain a lot of valuable stuff, there ought to be both guards and an alarm system there. “Did the alarms go off?” 

Thor did show them the way inn through the entrance and up some stairs which reminded Bard of the grand staircase in the movie Titanic. Some lords and ladies in Edwardian costumes would have looked just natural there. Thor shook his head. “No, and it is a mystery why! This place is a veritable Fort Knox, not even an ant can enter here without being checked out from its ass to its antennae.” 

Thran almost giggled but Bard managed to stay calm. “Was anything taken?” 

Thor sighed, he did look worried all of a sudden. “Yes, and that is why I called you guys inn, I will let the master of the house explain this himself” 

They heard footsteps and turned around, a tall but elderly man appeared pushing an old fashioned wheelchair ahead of him and inn it sat a person who at first glance did look like a sort of dummy. He was small and wrinkled and the hair was thin and white but the eyes were clear and showed both determination and intelligence, but also a sort of slight confusion. He cocked his head and raised an eyebrow. “So, this is the city’s finest, pleased to meet two such…pleasant specimens” 

Bard almost choked, the tone of the voice couldn’t be misinterpreted, neither could the roguish expression within the old man’s eyes. Thran didn’t lose his cools though, he just bowed slightly. “We are very pleased to meet you Sir” 

The man pushing the wheelchair caught their attention. “I am Theodore Gamling, Mr Baggins butler, I can help answer any questions you may have, my employers mind tends to…veer off a bit” 

Bard nodded. “The chef was murdered?” 

The butler nodded slowly. “Yes, a most horrible thing. Jacques is beloved by us all here, such a talented man.” 

Thran did blush a bit, Mr Bagging were eying his ass the same way a hungry dog stares at a juicy steak, he know knew why Mr Baggins never showed himself in public anymore, and why he hadn’t married. Bard saw that the butler was visibly upset. “Tell me the details please” 

Mr Gamling did make a grimace. “The lady in charge of cleaning the second floor here came across him just an hour ago, he had been beaten to death with something heavy, his skull was more or less crushed and the body pushed into the old fireplace. It does look grotesque” 

Thran frowned. “In which room?” 

The butler pointed up a flight of stairs which was wide enough to make room for a huge carriage. “The old smoking room, it is now a museum of sorts, lots of very heavy objects so we haven’t been able to see which one was used” 

Bard did see that the old man was staring at them both again and now his gaze seemed almost childlike. He was probably rather senile. “What do you mean?” 

Mr Gamling rolled his shoulders. “It is where we store Mr Baggins collection of old weapons, we have pole axes, maces, swords, battle hammers, you name it. A hundred and ten objects which could all crush a skull” 

Thor had returned downstairs so Thran asked. “Is the forensics there now?” 

The butler nodded. “Yes, they are, trying to find the murder weapon, I bet they will spend most of the day up there. The body has been removed already, there was just so much blood, it made Mr Baggins very upset”   
Bard stared at the stairs. “Thor said something had been taken?” 

The butler nodded. “Yes, and it is something which…well, let me show you gentlemen what the thief took” 

He lifted a folder from the room at the back of the backrest and opened it, handed over a large photo to Bard. He stared at a huge blue gem with an intense shine and he had to gasp. A pair of rings were placed next to it and judging by the size of them the gem was the size of a toddlers head. “Good God, what is that thing?” 

Mr Gamling shrugged. “Try priceless? One of a kind? Unique?” 

Thran swallowed visibly. “I have heard of it” 

Mr Gamling nodded. “Of course you have sir, it is famous after all. The only gem of its kind in this whole world” 

Bard stared even harder at the photo. “Is it a diamond? A Sapphire?” 

The butler shrugged. “Nobody knows for sure. It was found in 1224 in what is now the Syrian desert by a nomad. It was sold to some wealthy merchant and then it made its way through history, and into infamousness. “ 

Bard did frown and Thran grinned. “It is called the Arkenstone, and the myths claim that everybody who owns it dies horribly. It is said to be evil” 

Bard handed the photo back to the butler “I do not believe in curses Sir” 

Mr Gamling nodded. “Neither do I, but there is truth in it. The gem is lethal. A sultan wanted the gem mounted on top of his crown and both he and the jewellery smith hired for the job died within a week of each other. They weren’t the only ones I am afraid” 

Thran cocked his head. “I have heard of this yes” 

Bard did stare at him and Thran smiled. “The gem was part of a meteorite, and it is radioactive as hell” 

Bard felt a sudden need to back off. “Ah, really?” 

Mr Baggins were humming some song now, smiling to himself, it wasn’t possible to make out what song it was though. The butler nodded. “Yes, in the old days nobody understood this concept of course so they said the gem was cursed but now we do know better. The gem was kept in a safe all the time and it was special made. It wasn’t taken out ever, and only a copy was shown off to the public every now and then. Mr Baggins did come across it when he did visit some old European kingdom in the sixties. The ones who owned it was of royal blood and had kept the bloody thing hidden from the Nazis, which was a remarkable feat for some of the most stir crazy of them were ready to murder entire villages to get their hands on this rock. They say that if Hitler had managed to get this stone they would have had the A bomb way before we did” 

Bard shuddered. “Such a happy thought, I am glad it is, or rather, was here” 

The butler sighed. “The one who took it knew the house, the safe was hidden, nobody except me and Mr Baggins knew where it was and we have several fake ones placed within the house, with very believable copies hidden within. Whoever it was, the thief knew what he or she was after and how to get it” 

Thran frowned. “So only you and Mr Baggins knew which safe was the real one? Nobody else?” 

Mr Gamling did nod. “Yes, the company which installed it allowed us to bring the workers inn blindfolded and at night so they couldn’t find the room again later on” 

Bard found this a bit extreme. “But, doesn’t Mr Baggins have anyone else here than you? Servants? Family? Friends?” 

Mr Gamling made a grimace. “Yes, he does have a nephew, of a sorts. He is in his thirties now and a very nice young man, very decent but a bit naïve. He lives a few blocks away with his friend Samwise, but I doubt that Frodo would have anything to do with this. I don’t believe he even knows about the Arkenstone” 

Thran did look thoughtful. “I think I met them once, at a party at Thingol’s. Frodo is an accountant?” 

The butler nodded. “Yes he is, works for Westwood finances. A very good job and he is rock solid” 

Thran nodded. “But the gem is stolen, and it cannot be sold, everybody would know it is stolen so whoever wants it wants it for him or herself. You can’t even sit and admire it for more than a while I suppose?” 

Mr Gamling nodded. “Yes, being closer to it than two meters over more time than five minutes is like taking a jog around the Chernobyl disaster site. It is very dangerous to your health” 

Thran grimaced and his eyes were dark. “Then I fear that the reason for the theft can be a sinister one” 

Bard swallowed hard. “Terrorism?” 

Thran nodded slowly and he didn’t look very happy at all. “Yes, someone with knowledge and resources. The cameras shows nothing?” 

Mr Gamling nodded. “Yes, something knocked them out for ten minutes, that was all that was needed” 

Mr Baggins started giggling loudly. “I bet they are beeping, oh yes how they are beeping” 

Bard blinked. “Ha?” 

Mr Gamling made an apologetic grin. “He remembers when the gem was placed within its vault, they used Geiger counters to make sure that the workers didn’t get too much radiation” 

Thran stared at the surroundings. “You have cameras everywhere yes? Were there any signs of where the culprit entered the house?” 

Mr Gamling sort of shrunk a little. “No, no doors were forced open, no windows either but there was one door which was unlocked by accident.” 

Bard stared at him with hope. “Which one?” 

The butler did look apologetic. “A very small door at the back of the house, at the other side of the kitchens. It is an old servants exit really and few know it is there. Mr Baggins has an old dog called Azog and it needs to be taken outside every now and then. The kitchen maid did take the mutt for a walk last night and forgot to lock the door afterwards, or rather, she thought she had locked it but the lock is old and hadn’t closed as it should, that can happen with that sort of lock” 

Thran was thinking hard, Bard saw it. “Could she be lying?” 

The butler shook his head almost violently. “Amanda? No way, she is sixteen, and the sweetest girl imaginable. She is helping out in the kitchens and we wouldn’t have managed everything without her. No, she has nothing to do with this, I am very sure.” 

Bard had started taking notes. “Could that be the door through which the culprit entered?” 

Mr Gamling shrugged. “Hardly, he would have had to pass through the kitchen and there were people at work there at five this morning. Nobody gets through the kitchens unseen, you would need to be a ghost” 

Bard growled to himself. “Well, are there other entrances to the house? Unusual ones, ones nobody would think off? “

The butler did hesitate. “Uh, the roof? The doors are locked though?” 

Thran got eager. “Show me, right now!”

Mr Gamling rang a bell and a young servant wearing a completely ridiculous uniform came hurrying. “I cannot go with you, I have to look after Mr Baggins here, he cannot be left alone for even a moment. The old chap can still walk but at times…let us just say that every bar closet and fridge has to remain locked when he is around. He is a bit fond of…strong drinks” 

Mr Baggins did grin from one ear to the other, he was truly a sweet old man in some ways. Bard thought so until Mr Baggins belched and started to sing again, with a thin and shivering voice. “Beer Beer, wonderful beer, oh how I wish that my barrel was here…”

The butler rolled his eyes and did look tired. He waved at the younger servant. “Allan, do take these gentlemen to the roof and do as they ask” 

Allan did bow and Bard did wait until they were well on their way up the stairs before he did ask. “That uniform looks dreadful, like something from an old fashioned fetish party!”

The servant nodded firmly and he did look a bit bothered. “Yes, but the old ba….Mr Baggins does prefer this style. He is an old pervert still.” 

Thran did chuckle. “Oh I remember all I have read about him, he has caused some scandals in his time. Once he did run off with the groom at a wedding and another time he did seduce the son of a very important foreign dignitary.” 

Allan nodded. “One should expect his libido to have dwindled at this age but nope, the tree trunk can be old and rotting but the twig is still stiff!” 

The stairs leading to the roof were steep and narrow and the three men had to walk behind each other to get up, Bard did shudder. There was no light there and the stairs didn’t look very inviting at all. He was about to ask Allan if he had seen anything out of the ordinary when the phone rang. It was Judith’s number and he did wave at Thran to tell him to go on, he would catch up with the two others afterwards. He answered and Judith’s voice did reveal that she was upset right away. “Bard, are you busy?” 

“Yes, very much so, how come?” 

Judith was almost panting. “I have discovered something terrible, they brought inn this teenage girl earlier today and everybody said it was a suicide but I discovered something when I opened her up. She was pregnant!” 

Bard frowned. “And she couldn’t have chosen to end herself because of that? I mean, a pregnancy can be a disaster for someone that young?”

Judith was almost running, he could hear the sound of her heels. “I doubt it, she was a resourceful one, from a rich family. I need to talk to her parents, and find the father of that baby. The drug she had taken, it wasn’t painkillers at all, it was something I haven’t come across before, some mixture of substances and what if it was murder?” 

Bard sighed. “Judith, I cannot help you now, I am sorry. We have a potential terrorist crisis on our hands. Can’t you take care of this?”

Judith was slamming a car door shut. “Damn it Bard, I am a coroner, not an investigator. Thor will throw a tantrum” 

Bard had to grin to himself. “So why are you doing it still?” 

Judith was growling. “Because that kid deserves justice, and everybody is busy. I have called Elisa though, she meets me at their home” 

Bard nodded slowly, the two ladies ought to be able to solve this. “Good luck to you then, do call if you find something” 

He did put his phone away and ran after the others up the steep stairs.   
The roof was not flat, it was dominated by a taller structure in the middle and Allan told Thran it was the elevators and AC units which occupied those rooms, and a couple of cisterns too. The house even had a generator in case of a power outage and they could collect enough water to last them for a month. Thran was still a bit puzzled, how had anyone known where the gem was? And for what purpose had it been stolen. Allan did take a look around. “I doubt that anyone has been up here Sir, the door was locked.” 

Thran nodded. “I saw that yes, but whoever the thief is, he has to be very clever!” 

They stood there in deep thought as Bard caught up with them, he did take a look at the roof and they started to walk around, slowly. Thran tried every door there but they were all locked and according to Allan only the butler had the keys. There were no signs of any doors being damaged in any way and Thran shivered and frowned. “This is rather useless I fear, it doesn’t seem as if anything here is out of order at all. “

Bard was about to answer when his watch started to beep in a very odd manner. He had gotten it for his last birthday from Thran and it was very expensive with a heck of a lot of functions besides showing what time it was. Thran raised an eyebrow and Bard lifted the watch, stared at the display. It was blinking, a very well known symbol was visible on it and Allan paled. “Oh shit, is that …a radiation warning?!”

Thran cussed and turned around, they had just passed by one of the air intakes for the ventilation system and he stood there and looked a bit unsure until he sort of got a grasp of himself and reached out, grasped the grid which protected the intake and lo and behold, it was lose. Bard blinked. “Oh goddamn it, don’t tell me…” 

Thran nodded. “The gem is in here, it has to be, the radiation is so strong, too strong to be residual, your watch wouldn’t have noticed it if it were.” 

Thran reached into the air intake and he made a grimace. “There is something here indeed, ah, it is heavy” 

He pulled with all his might and slowly he did pull forth his catch, it was a soup tureen, made from silver and very elaborate and inside it something did move. Thran did remove the lid and a bright bluish shine did appear. “We have found the gem it seems” 

Allan did blink, he did look flabbergasted to say the least. “ But…what is going on?!” 

Thran sighed. “We have looked at this the wrong way the whole time, it isn’t about the gem, it’s about the chef!”

Allan blinked and his face was a bit blank. “Ha? But…Jacques was so well liked?” 

Bard realized where Thran was heading. “Here yes, but he did have a life beside the job here too didn’t he? I bet we will find the answer to the questions downstairs, as soon as we have put the gem back in its vault” 

Thran held the tureen on an arms-length and carried it with a mine which told everyone he’d rather carry a live hand grenade. Bard couldn’t blame him, that goddamn gem was so bright the tureen was glowing. They ran down the stairs and were met by Mr Gamling who was trying to wrestle a pocket bottle out of the hands of Mr Baggins, the butler was winning but just barely. Mr Gamling shook his head and sighed. “No more Glenfiddish for you this late, you will be awake until the next century goddamn it, and chase every skirt you see!”

Mr Baggins did giggle. “Not skirts, kilts! Oh that handsome scotsman, what was his name again…he had the equipment of a…”

The butler almost gagged the old man with a desperate move. “Sorry Sirs, he is…rowdy at this time of the day, and way too fond of his scotch.” 

Bard just shuddered, the old man had to have been a true libertine. “That is alright, but we have found the gem, in a soup tureen, hidden in an AC vent on the roof” 

Mr Gamling did look as if his lower jaw was about to fall off. “What?!”

Thran sighed. “Where is the goddamn vault, the thing is hot, and I mean in the physical sense, it radiates heat damn it” 

The butler stared at Allan with huge eyes. “Watch the old…Mr Baggins for a while will you?” 

Allan made a grimace but did walk over to the wheelchair and the old man did try to grope his ass with a lusty expression on his face.   
The butler ran ahead into a small room which was adjacent to a small kitchen and there he did lift a wine barrel and a part of the wall did move sideways and revealed a small opening in the brick wall. Behind it was a metal door with a combination lock and Mr Gamling did punch in the right numbers. The door opened and inside was a small room, barely more than a few feet across since the walls were extremely thick. Thran handed the tureen over to the butler who placed it in the middle of the opening rather unceremoniously and then slammed the door shut. “So, why would anyone steal it and just leave it, and how did that person get in here? And out?” 

Thran smiled, there was a glimpse in his eyes which told Bard that Thran right now was in his best Sherlock Holmes mode, and ready to solve a mystery. “That my good butler is a good question, and the answer can be found within this very building!”  
\-----------------  
Judith was driving towards the home of the deceased girl, she used an ordinary car but she did have a police radio for she did enjoy listening to the things which were going on. Now she was trying not to explode out of sheer frustration, the traffic moved with the speed of an obese slug and she rolled her eyes and felt that she surely would have been able to move faster on foot. The radio cracked and she heard that it was dispatch contacting the emergency call station, she did recognize the voice of the lady on watch now. “We have a code red, Barton and Upper street number 8, female, age seventeen, collapse and unconsciousness, the girl is seizing” 

Judith didn’t hear the reply, she stared straight ahead at the rear of the car in front of her, it was the same thing, her instincts told her so. It was suddenly more important than ever to talk to the parents of the dead girl. Elisa was waiting by the driveway, her little blue sedan was neatly parked and the investigator did look like a lawyer today, with some fancy new shoes and a very elegant skirt and jacket. Judith did blink. “You look smashing today?” 

Elisa nodded. “Because I know these people, or rather, their type. They will never listen to an ordinary cop but if I look like someone from their own social circle then they will be more friendly.” 

Judith sighed. “We need that, good idea. So, let us see if we can get to the bottom of this shall we?” 

They went over and rang the bell and a woman who had to be the housekeeper did open the door and Judith introduced her as the county coroner. It was a title which held some power and they were let inn. The parents were in the living room with a couple of teenagers and a woman who could be the sister of the mother. Judith bowed her head. “First of all, our deepest condolences.” 

The mother sniffed, she was a beauty but now her face was red and swollen and she did look rather bad. “Why are you here?” 

Judith tried to smile. “I am here because I fear that your daughter didn’t take her own life”

The woman let out a wail. “Oh I knew it, Suzanna would never do something that terrible, she had everything, she was happy!” 

The father did stare at Judith. “What do you mean?” 

Judith took a step forth, Elisa was right beside her and gave her a bit of courage. “Suzanna was pregnant. I think she has tried to end the pregnancy, and it failed with her death as the result!” 

The mother paled and the man grasped her hand, tried to support her. “Hanna, please dear, don’t pass out”

Hanna was shivering. “That cannot be…We have taught her so well, and she knows all about birth control and the risks of sex. She would come to us, not try to hide it?” 

The father nodded. “Yes, we would support her, no matter what! This…I cannot understand, how far along was she?”

Judith tried to remain calm. “At least three months, too late for a legal abortion” 

Hanna wailed, a desperate sound. “Oh Dean, where did we fail her? What did we do?!”

Judith swallowed. “I am sorry to ask, but did she have a boyfriend? The baby had a father for sure” 

Dean tried to wipe his eyes. “Yes…she did date a boy, one of the most popular guys at her school, Jonathan Blackmoore, a very nice young man”

Hanna sobbed. “He is coming over as a matter of fact, should be here soon” 

Judith bit her teeth together. “Excellent, then we would prefer to stay here and wait for him if it is alright? Suzanna had a drug in her system which can be used to provoke an abortion, the question is whether or not she did take it out of her own free will”   
Dean gasped. “Jonathan would never force her to do something like that!”

Hanna nodded. “He is a good lad, oh God, this is horrible. My poor sweet girl!”

Elisa did nod at Judith. “Do you know of anyone who would want to hurt Suzanna?”

The mother shook her head but Dean did make a grimace. “I think…I overheard her once, she spoke to a friend on her phone and the conversation was about a girl at her school. I just heard them call her Sammy and they said she was a bitch of epic proportions. Now, teenage girls does know the art of exaggeration to perfection but I did get the feeling that this girl was a real problem” 

Judith nodded. “Did Suzanna have a phone or a laptop or something? Can we take a look at it?”

Hanna did nod. “Yes, of course, do whatever you wish with it, as long as you find out why my beautiful girl is dead” 

Dean got up. “Follow me please” 

They followed the tall man up a flight of stairs and along a corridor. They entered a room which did look very much like an ordinary girl’s bedroom, pink and pastel colours, posters of movie stars and pop icons on the walls and a veritable sea of plush animals. There was a cell phone on the desk and Judith grasped it, praying it wasn’t locked or anything. It wasn’t, the battery was low but they plugged it into a loader and Judith took a deep breath and opened the message box. At first everything did look normal, a few messages from teachers regarding some school projects, some from her parents, a message from the local library concerning a book she had ordered. Then came a message which immediately sent Judith’s senses reeling. “You bitch, you stole him. Don’t think you can keep him you whore, I know what you are hiding!”

Elisa saw the message too and her eyes got huge. “The number is from a disposable phone, it cannot be traced. Shit!”

Judith scrolled further down the list. “Look at this”

She showed it to Elisa who read it out loud. “Jonathan is mine, I don’t care if you have fucked him, you don’t own him. I will get him back” 

“That is one seriously disturbed person for sure, those threats?” 

Judith nodded. “I can almost smell the bile yes, this has to be a former lover of Jonathan” 

Elisa did grimace. “Or someone who believes that she ought to be with him instead of Suzanna” 

They heard the door bell and Judith smiled. “If we are lucky we can solve this right now! I bet that is Jonathan himself” 

They got back downstairs and saw a tall young man who did appear to be in tears, Judith did find him likeable right away, he did look like an honest and mature young man and they waited until Hanna and Dean had talked to him. Hanna did raise a hand. “Jonathan, this is the county coroner and an investigator from the main police office. They have some questions, they believe that Suzanna was murdered” 

The boy did gape, then his eyes blazed, there was true rage and true sorrow within his gaze. “Oh God, I feared it!”

Judith did step forth and introduced herself and Jonathan was trembling. “Please, what happened to her?”

Judith did bring the boy with her into a small room next to the living room. “Jonathan, did you know that Suzanna was pregnant?” 

He did take a deep breath. “Yes, she told me, I think it was…four weeks ago? Yes”

Judith did frown. “Why didn’t she tell her parents?”

Jonathan did take a deep breath. “Because she didn’t want to disappoint them, she would have to cancel her college plans if she had a baby and Hanna and Dean are wonderful people but it would crush their hearts if she had to abandon all her plans. She told me she was going to get it fixed”

Judith did stare at him. “And you did agree?” 

He shook his head. “Heck no, my old man raised me to be responsible, I was ready to be there for her, even get a job and work to keep us together. But she…she was so distant, she didn’t want to talk about it, even though she should” 

Judith nodded. “She was in denial, unable to cope with it. But she did die with drugs in her, do you have any idea of where she could have gotten them? And by the way, do you know a girl by the name of Samantha?” 

Jonathan scoffed. “Sammy the mad hatter? Sure, she has had a crush on me for like forever, and I cannot stand her, nobody can. She is a real…sorry ma’am but she is a bitch!” 

Judith tilted her head. “How come?” 

Jonathan did shrug. “She ruins it for everybody, she has done some terrible things to others when she thinks they have done something she disapproves off. She once did fill nair into the shampoo bottle of a girl she didn’t like, and they do believe that she cut the brake wires on some girl’s scooter, poor thing almost died” 

Judith felt a chill going down her spine. “Jonathan, listen, if somebody were to buy say illegal morning after pills, where would they go?” 

The boy did blush. “Oh, there is only one guy at our school who sells drugs, everybody knows it but there haven’t been enough evidence yet to put him behind bars.” 

Judith almost growled. “That changes now, I bet Suzanna got the pills from him, I heard on the police radio that another girl collapsed today, those pills are lethal. Who is he, and where can he be found?” 

Jonathan swallowed hard. “Bert, Bert Becker, he is a scumbag and a looser but thinks he is he-man or something like that. Everybody knows he is using steroids” 

Judith rolled her eyes, huge and aggressive and unpredictable? Great! “He is usually hanging out around the gym hall, mocking everybody who isn’t as large as himself” 

Judith nodded. “Alright, then we do know who to contact next.” 

Jonathan wetted his lips. “Ma’am, if he sold Suzanna poisonous pills, make him hurt, please?” 

Judith sent the lad a devilish grin. “Oh I will, believe me I will!” 

She went over to Elisa and bid Hanna and Dean goodbye and then they both took off in Elisa’s car. “Do you carry a gun?” 

Elisa did sound worried and Judith nodded. “Yes, a 9mm, and more so, I have combat training. I think that Mister Becker will discover that I am a kitty cat with claws”

Elisa did pet her hip. “I have a 9mm too, I prefer not to use it but I will if I have to”

Judith nodded. “Don’t we all!”

After half an hour they parked by the school and walked over to the gymnastics department, the school had a huge new hall and Judith did point discretely. “See? By the bicycles! The guy with the acne and the bad posture” 

Elisa did nod, the guy was six foot three and his posture was indeed bad, he did look like some caricature of a gorilla, only that a gorilla would be way prettier. Judith whispered. “We both look a bit like teachers in these clothes, don’t act like a cop until you have to” 

Judith did see that the lad was talking to two other boys and they both did show that they were intimidated by the large boy, but they were clearly after something and Judith hid a cruel grin, she had no sympathy for drug dealers. She walked by like she had every right to be there and nodded at the two boys who sort of fled the scene when they saw the two adults. Judith did put on her prettiest grin, she was an attractive woman and she knew it too. “Hello there, listen I happen to have a friend who has a bit of a problem…a little one if you catch my drift? And they say that you can provide some…relief” 

The boy frowned, his brain didn’t work very fast at all but finally it did sink inn. “Yeah, I have them pills, they take care of it yeah” 

Judith did batter her eyelashes. “Wonderful, may I ask where you get them? My friend is a bit…picky” 

The boy just grinned. “A friend of mine, she buys them over the border” 

Judith sighed inwardly. Mexico, they could be a mixture of God alone knew what, no wonder Suzanna had died. She cocked her head again and her grin got devious. “ Ah, the friend of yours, her name shouldn’t happen to be Samantha?” 

The guy blinked. “Duuude, how do you know?” 

Judith bared her teeth. “Because you sold some pills to a girl yesterday and she is dead today, that friend of yours did that on purpose and you are just as guilty as her unfortunately. “

The tiny brain did finally manage to sort things out and Bert let out a roar and charged at Judith, but he had misjudged her abilities. Judith had served as a doctor in the army and her training did also contain unarmed combat. She flipped the boy over like he was a piece of cloth and then she did twist his arm and heard a very satisfying popping sound coming from his shoulder and a scream from him. Elisa had already hailed a cruiser and another officer with her radio and before two minutes had passed by the cruiser rushed through the gate with lights and sirens. “Now you poor excuse for a human being, where is Samantha?” 

Bert cussed, his arm was dislocated and he was in a lot of pain, Judith didn’t care. “She is having class I bet”

They handed the cussing and swearing teenager over to the officers and then they ran over to the main building. They showed Elisa’s badge to the door guard and was let inn and the lady in the reception did know where Samantha was and she did in fact look thrilled all of a sudden, this Samantha was obviously not very popular. Judith and Elisa did walk towards the classroom, it was a large one with a glass wall and the class was busy writing something with the teacher slowly walking around. Judith saw Samantha right away, she sat in a corner and was busy on her phone instead of working and her looks told Judith everything. She had never seen a girl with more Gucci and Chanel, and her school bag was a Louis Vuitton. Spoiled brat was the thing Judith thought and Elisa caught the attention of the teacher with a friendly smile. The teacher, an elderly woman with greying hair and a tired expression did enter the hallway and Judith presented herself. She told the teacher of the situation and the woman did gape. “Oh dear Jesus, oh that…Samantha is a…she is a problem, but that is…that is evil!” 

Elisa nodded. “We know, can you send her out here? Without causing her to flee? We need to make her talk, there could be more lives at stake here” 

The teacher grinned. “I can lie, she has lied to me so often it doesn’t feel wrong at all!” 

Judith smiled and her eyes were firm. “Do it, we will wait down the hallway” 

The teacher did enter the classroom again and talked to Samantha who pouted and looked bored and angry. She packed her bag and exited the room and Judith and Elisa did wait for her, they both did look like teachers and the girl got up to them and glared at them. “So, what is this about? Some fashion magazine?” 

Judith smiled and petted her on the shoulder. Elisa did walk behind the girl and fast as lightening she did handcuff the girl who shrieked and started to wriggle. “What the fuck?!”

Judith nodded. “Exactly, you are under arrest for murder miss, Suzanna is dead and so is her baby, and another girl is in the emergency room right now, probably fighting for her life so if she dies that is three murders, perhaps four. That will be…let me see…at least two lifetimes in jail, if not more” 

Samantha gaped. “Fuck you! I didn’t mean for the bitch to die damn it, I just wanted that brat out of her so she didn’t have a hold on Jonathan anymore!”

Elisa stared at Samantha with narrow eyes. “The pills, you gave them to Bert right and told him to sell them to Suzanna if she came asking for them” 

The girl almost spat at them. “So fucking what?!” 

Judith shook her head. “That is premeditated, you got them in Mexico?”

She sneered. “Yeah, at a ranch, we go there to ride and have fun. The stable had all sorts of drugs. I just took them, you cannot prove anything!”

Judith smiled and the smile was not pretty. “Oh but we can, the jury will love this for sure, I bet they won’t need even ten minutes to pass a sentence. “ 

Samantha was wriggling. “I am underage, you cannot put me in jail!”

Elisa smiled. “Oh no? youth camp then, run by ex-military trainers, oh they will straighten you up like none other, the discipline is rather rough” 

The girl did pale, for the first time. “No, fuck, you cannot…there are no phones there…No!”

Judith was smiling again, a wide one. “Oh yes we can, and we will. It is exactly what you need. Some hard work and discipline. Well, if you confess the judge will perhaps be satisfied with five years instead of ten”

Samantha gaped, she was trembling. “But…it isn’t fair. Jonathan was mine, he ought to be mine. The most popular boys have always been mine!”

Elisa did tsk, she shook a finger. “Young lady, when I was your age a girl who behaved like that was called a slut and I do believe that the title is very suitable for you. I think Jonathan is a very nice young man who has managed to stay clear of your clutches.”

Samantha did hiss and Judith did grasp her phone and called the hospital, explained the situation and that the drug in question was one used on horses and cattle. The girl who had been brought inn had survived so far but now they had a much greater chance of saving her since they knew the type of drug. Samantha was hauled off in a police vehicle and Elisa called Thor and explained the situation. He did offer to call Samantha’s parents, they were a famous pair of actors and he had never liked them so he would enjoy telling them that their precious little bundle of malice would spend some years wearing army green instead of Gucci. Judith did high five Elisa before they got back into the car, they had done it and possibly saved many lives for Bert had a whole bag of those goddamn pills. Judith felt happy as she drove back to the station, she had restored the name of Suzanna and solved the mystery, the family could rest assured that their daughter didn’t try to end her own life but was betrayed. It was a good feeling, she just hoped that Bard and Thran were as lucky as she had been this day.   
\----------  
Thran was almost running down towards the kitchens and Bard was more than a little stunned by his sudden excitement. Mr Gamling was trying to keep up with them and he did look rather confused too. The kitchens of this house were grand, you could have fitted a normal restaurant into it and Thran did rush in as if he did belong there. The staff stopped working and stared at the tall blonde with huge eyes, he knew how to make an entrance for sure. Mr Gamling did grimace, this was against protocol for sure, nobody were to enter the kitchens like that, hygiene had to be considered at all times. Thran caught everybody’s attention with a gesture and Bard realized that he really enjoyed this.   
The staff were most younger people and Bard did notice that the kitchen was extremely well organized and clean. Thran did smile. “So, you lost your boss last night, have any of you noticed something else which is missing?” 

One of the workers did nod eagerly. “Yes, a soup tureen, it is very valuable. Jacques was to polish it last night and now it is gone. It was a gift from some royal dude so it would be too bad if it was stolen” 

Thran cocked his head. “Worry not, it is still in the house, containing the infamous Arkenstone.”

Everybody was blinking, staring at each other. “Uh, what?!”

Thran did smile. “Oh yes, the one who murdered the chef is here now, within this kitchen.” 

Everybody stared at the person next to them with some shock but it did somehow look a bit theatrical and Thran continued. “Jacques was found murdered in the old smoking room, with a crushed head. It is normal to assume that the murder weapon was taken from the walls of the very room itself, after all, it contained lots of medieval weapons”

Mr Gamling nodded. “Yes? “ 

Bard was feeling frustrated, where was Thran going with this? His husband did walk over to one of the huge washing machines with nonchalant moves. He opened it and revealed a lot of freshly washed plates…and a huge club used to tenderize meat. “I am rather sure that you haven’t served any steak for a few days right? “ 

The one in charge of the kitchens did step forth, he was a bit pale but Bard did notice that he didn’t look all that surprised. “No, we haven’t. Uh…don’t tell me that…” 

Thran was practically beaming. “Oh yes, this club is the murder weapon, now chemically free from fingerprints or any other sorts of evidence.” 

Some of the staff did look a wee bit green, the butler swallowed visibly. “What are you saying?” 

Thran made a grand gesture. “I am saying that the murder of Jacques was a crime which wasn’t planned, it was done in desperation and then someone helped the murderer camouflage the scene as a theft.”

Bard did wet his lips. “What makes you say that?” 

Thran turned to him with a wry grin. “Because stuffing the body into the fireplace is overkill, and why take the tureen? This was an act of fear or something akin to it” 

Everybody were quiet, a few did look down. Thran did grin again, he did remind Bard of the Chesire cat for a moment. “So, who was it I wonder? Jacques was well liked yes? A respected chef and a genius, but everybody has a darker side, I bet his was very well hidden” 

The one in charge did wet his lips, he did look nervous and some of the others too didn’t meet Thran’s eyes. “Come on, out with it, I bet you will feel better whence the truth is out there” 

There was silence and the workers didn’t move an inch, Bard could feel the nervous energy within the room. Thran did grasp the club, tested the weight of it. “This packs quite a punch I must say, it takes some power to wield it, or like I said, desperation. “ 

Bard saw that one of the workers were sweating, it was a young man of perhaps twenty and he was rather handsome and did look very pale. “You, yes you over by the oven there, you look as if you are about to pass out” 

The young man gasped and shivered visibly. The one in charge did sigh and closed his eyes. “Listen, it isn’t what you think, nobody was supposed to get hurt, and he brought it all onto himself” 

Thran was almost purring. “ Ah, go on, explain this all to us” 

The man did twirl his chef’s hat with his hands. “Jacques was a good man, a great chef and a good friend too but…he had a weakness” 

Thran was staring at the cook with rather hard eyes. “Drugs right?” 

The cook did nod. “Yes, the pressure of having such a job? It is terrible, everything has to be perfect all the time and he was working like a madman all the time. So yes, on occasions he did…indulge himself with some rather illegal substances. “ 

Thran sighed. “Right, and what happened last night, he was high right?” 

The man nodded slowly. “Yes, he was…he did sometimes become very agitated when under the influence, almost mad I would say. And yesterday was no exception, he was acting as if he was insane. He took the tureen to polish it and demanded that Kurt here did help him with the job.” 

The younger man did almost sob and Bard did notice that he had a bruise barely visible underneath his coat. “Jacques did attack him….”

The cook nodded. “Yes, it was as if he had become an animal all of a sudden, he started beating Kurt with the meat tenderizer and Kurt did run off, in a panic. I ran after them but lost track of them, this house is a maze”

Thran nodded. “And then you found them…” 

The cook made a grimace. “I did, I heard Kurt scream and ran towards the sound. Jacques had….” 

Kurt started sobbing, he was trembling like a leaf and Bard felt a surge of sympathy. “He was trying to rape the boy” 

Thran’s voice was dry and the cook nodded. “He wasn’t trying to, he was raping him and the club lay there next to them and I grasped it and I don’t know, I panicked and struck him just once to make him stop and that…” 

Bard finished the sentence. “Was enough to kill him, I see” 

The cook stared at Kurt. “I couldn’t let Jacque continue, he was inhuman, like some zombie. I have never seen anyone act like that before. When we realized he was dead we had to think fast to camouflage it” 

Bard frowned. “Why did you do that? If you had called the cops right away it would have been deemed as an accident” 

The cook bit his lower lip. “We didn’t want his name to be ruined, Jacques was a good person normally, we did adore him but…he wasn’t himself when he was high. And…we didn’t want to risk our jobs. So I took the gem and hid it and tried to make it look like a burglary.” 

Thran did stare at him. “Only the butler knew where the gem was hidden? And what about the cameras?” 

The cook did try to smile. “I saw Mr Baggins once when he was admiring the gem, I was polishing some silver ware and he didn’t realize that I was there. So I saw the vault and the combination was his nephew’s birthday, everybody knows that he uses that for everything. I thought that if everybody believed that somebody had broken into the house they wouldn’t check us workers” 

He pointed at one of the other men there, a short stocky guy with a crew cut and a somewhat red face. “Daniel here is an expert on computers, he did hack into the computer which controls the cameras and erased what they had recorded and made it appear as if they had stopped working for a while. “ 

Thran sighed. “You were all inn on it weren’t you?” 

Several heads did nod. One of the women there tried to smile. “Yes, most of us are, we did wash the blood from the floor, and helped Bob here stuff the body into the fireplace. If people found out that Jacques did rape a boy and used drugs the reputation of his restaurant would plummet and several would lose their jobs” 

Thran turned to Bard. “Thor will love this, it wasn’t terrorism after all, just an attempt at hiding something way more tragic” 

Kurt did sob and two of the girls did hug him gently. Bard made a grimace. “Listen, are you harmed? Did he…did he really manage to…do it`?” 

The young man did nod. “Yes, he…he did! He was so strong, he just ripped my clothes and…oh God!” 

Bard got closer. “Are there injuries?” 

Kurt nodded, he didn’t look at any of them. “I am bleeding…and it hurts!”

Thran made a grimace. “Right, you are off to hospital young man and you Bob are going with us, don’t worry, I know the judge and when he hear your story I bet he will determine that it was unintentional.” 

Bob was still pale. “I really didn’t mean to kill him, I just thought I would give him a bump on the head or something, or at least get him off the boy.” 

Bard grasped his hands and hand cuffed him. “We know, we have good lawyers and they will make sure that you aren’t convicted of anything, you tried to save someone after all” 

Thran picked up his phone but hesitated. “You say he was on drugs, do you know what sort of drugs? “ 

One of the kitchen girls made a nasty grimace. “He kept his stash in one of the cupboards here, we aren’t allowed near it but now…I guess it doesn’t matter anymore” 

She got over to a small cupboard in a corner and opened it. She reached inside and pulled out a bowl with some bags in it. They contained a sort of pills and Thran grasped the bowl and stared at the bags. “Sweet Lord, these are medication for animals?! Horses I think! No wonder he went insane!”

Bob swallowed hard. “He got them from some kid at the school downtown, a huge bully I think, named Bert? “ 

Bard petted Bob on the shoulder. “You do know that the gem is dangerous? You did put yourself in danger by handling it” 

Bob nodded. “I know, but it was just for a few seconds and yes, I do have a copy of Mr Gamling’s keys. He doesn’t know it though, but we are tired of having to find him whenever we need to unlock some door.” 

The butler did scoff loudly and Thran did grin. “That explains it yes” 

The girl who had showed them the pills did wet her lips. “Are we going to be punished?” 

Her voice was thin and Thran did sigh. “You did help cover up the scene of a crime and that is rather bad but I don’t think there will be much problems when the judge hears about this whole tale. So no, I doubt you will go to jail but perhaps there will be community service or something like that” 

Everybody seemed to breathe a deep sigh of relief and Mr Gamling was obviously distraught. “Oh God, I am so sorry I didn’t realize the truth, I have seen how odd Jacques acted at times but he was eccentric and full of himself all the time” 

Thran just waved his hand. “Don’t worry, the good thing is that the gem is safe and not in the hands of terrorists. But find a new place to hide it, too many know where it is now” 

The butler did nod and they walked out of the kitchen and placed Bob the cook into one of the squad cars. Thran did call Thor and Bard did see that his husband did get an odd expression within his face. He did look as if he didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry. Bard walked over to him. “What is it?” 

Thran leaned against the car. “Thor was so relieved to hear that the gem is found but guess what?” 

Bard tilted his head. “Uh what?” 

Thran had a peculiar glimpse within his eyes. “Judith and Elisa have already arrested the kid who sold the drugs to Jacques, apparently he did also sell drugs to the girl who’s death Judith did investigate. Talk about two flies with one strike ha?” 

Bard had to shake his head. “The world is small after all, then we have some extra evidence. Judith will love that, I think that case did upset her, a lot” 

Thran did squeeze his shoulders. “Yes, this has been a peculiar case. But we are done here, let’s go. There is still some hours left of the day and I am hungry. Beside, you owe me one” 

Bard had to blush. “Aye, I do. But not until we have eaten. Too bad the chef was killed, I bet he did make excellent food” 

Thran did grimace. “Bha, I know them high end chefs, artful food which costs more than your monthly salary and taste like crap. No, there is a burger joint over by the next intersection” 

Bard did laugh. “Greasy fatty burgers with lots of dressing and enough cheese to cause a major heart attack?” 

Thran did slide into the car with an elegant move. “Oh yes, you will need the extra energy, soon!”

Bard did just shake his head before he also placed himself into the car. It had indeed been an odd day. “Thran?” 

The blonde did nod and start the car “Yes love?`

Bard did grin. “You really love playing Hercule Poirot don’t you?” 

Thran did look like innocence incarnate as he drove out of the driveway. “Hercule who?” 

The glimpse in his eyes said it all and Bard chuckled all the way back to the station. 

There they met Judith who was thrilled to hear that Bert could be tied to even more crime and later that evening she did discover that the late chef in fact had a rare condition which left his skull very thin and fragile. The judge did drop any charge against the cook, it had been an accident and nobody could know that the famous chef had an eggshell skull. The kitchen staff had to serve food for the homeless for a month though and did it with both joy and zeal and Judith did tell Bard and Thran that Bert was placed in a very strict prison for juveniles. He would most certainly learn how to behave there. Sammy the mad hatter did spend five years in a correctional facility and managed to become the number one hate object of the entire staff within two days of her arrival, which ensured that her stay there became rather hellish. Some people just don’t’ know their own good.


	9. Slaying the dreamer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bard and Thran is getting involved in a very nasty case, and comes face to face with real life evil.

Chapter 9: Slaying the dreamer. 

Josh was having a bad day, as a matter of fact he was having a hell of a day. It had started with him oversleeping and arriving to the office half an hour too late. Then the boss did almost suffer an apoplectic seizure while telling him in details what would happen if he was ever late again and then the goddamn delivery truck wouldn’t even start. The batteries were dead. Now he was more than an hour late with the deliveries and he had been speeding through the city in order to make up for the lost time. The first two deliveries had gone smoothly, he had dropped off some packages at an antiquity store downtown and then a huge package at a private home. Now he did stand parked outside of a clothes store and he felt that his blood pressure was reaching the levels of Krakatau just before it blew itself to smithereens. The store owner was arguing and nagging and going through every single item on the list, it wasn’t Josh who decided the costs of the delivery damn it! Arguing with the driver didn’t make things even a wee bit cheaper. The store owner was this elderly woman with dyed hair and a terrible dress which in his eyes looked like something a clown would wear, it wasn’t even sewn very well. 

He was about to burst, he was running late, had ten more deliveries to make before lunch and he knew that some of the customers would complain to the boss if he was late. He couldn’t afford to lose this job, damn it! 

The old hag was gesticulating like mad, pointing at the list. “We did order two boxes of designer jeans, where is the other one?” 

Josh did count to ten, slowly. “I do not know ma’am, I was told to pick up one box and I have, if one is missing I suggest you contact the ones you ordered them from, obviously they have made a blunder” 

The woman almost sneered at him and Josh prayed to God the woman didn’t have kids, people this nasty shouldn’t breed. He had seen friendlier looking piranhas. “They said the parcels were sent, parcels, not parcel!”

Josh felt a need to roll his eyes but didn’t, you had to be polite towards the customers, even when they almost drove you to madness. “I don’t know anything about that ma’am, there was one packet in our warehouse with this address, not two” 

She growled and found a pen to sign for the delivery and that was when Josh accidentally did look up. Why he didn’t know but for a second there had been a shadow passing by and he saw something dark and rather large in the air and then there was a thud and the entire car did shake violently. The woman started to scream, wild piercing wails as she backed away towards the wall and Josh turned around. The middle of the delivery van was pushed down, and formed a V and in the middle of the V…..He too backed away, then he aimed for one of the huge pots placed outside of the store and hoped that it wasn’t an antique before he puked into it, rather violently.   
\-----------------  
Bard was staring at the van with a sense of slight disbelief, he had never seen anything this grotesque before. Thran was by his side and the tall blonde was mumbling something and looked more intrigued than disgusted. He did look up, the building was very tall, at least 30 floors and the fall had been so long the body had reached terminal velocity. No wonder the van was a total wreck. Judith was working on the body, or rather, the remains of the body. The impact had made the person more or less explode and she was standing on a small ladder and already she was covered with blood. Bard didn’t go any closer, there was blood and gore everywhere and the store owner and the delivery truck driver had both been taken away for treatment. Both were in shock and also covered with possible evidence. The entire street was sealed off and the journalists were as usual swarming around the perimeter like a bunch of hungry blowflies. He ignored them. “This has to be a suicide right?”

Judith did climb down from the van, she pulled her gloves off with a sigh. “Possibly, but we cannot know for sure” 

Thran did cock his head, he and Bard had enjoyed a short vacation and had just returned and their energy levels had been recharged for sure. Jean had taken care of the kids the whole time and it had renewed their bond, to the point where they were hardly able to keep their hands off each other. “But you do know something right?” 

The coroner nodded. “The deceased was a female, probably in her early twenties or late teens, slightly obese and also wearing naught but a nightgown of the fancy type.” 

Bard did cringe. “Gods, that young?” 

Judith did nod. “Yeah, I would most definitely suspect this to be a suicide but I will need to look deeper into it for sure. And I bet she must have lived in this building, there are apartments at the top levels.” 

Bard frowned. “They are expensive? How can a young person afford one of those?” 

Judith sighed and nodded to the two men who were responsible for removing the body. “It could be that someone else was paying the rent? We need to find out who she is” 

Thran pointed towards the building. “There is a building manager here for sure, he has to know who the tenants are” 

Bard smiled. “Yes, let us hear if that person knows the identity of the jumper”

The shop had been closed for the day and the crowd outside of the red tape was leering, Bard felt an urge to yell at them and go away. It was a dead person damn it, a human being and the sight of many cell phones being lifted to film or take photos made his blood boil. Thran did walk with his usual smooth gait and he entered the building. There were many gathered in the foyer, the ground level was a sort of shopping mall and then there were apartments on top of it and he did clap his hands and the crowd did fall silent. “Is there anybody here in charge of the building?” 

A stocky woman did step forth, she was probably in her early sixties and did look like a warm and caring person but there was also some sternness in her eyes. “I am the manager of this estate.” 

Thran did present himself and Bard and the woman did look very sad. “I am Cayla North, I have been in charge here for twenty years and we have never had a suicide! These are high end apartments” 

Bard just smiled but thought that the cost of the apartment didn’t in any way dictate the behaviour of the one living in it. He had in fact encountered far more suicides in nice places than in the bad areas of the city. Thran did smile and put his charm on and the woman smiled back, almost transfixed. “The dead person was a young woman, a bit overweight and with dark hair. Do that ring a bell?”

Cayla did blink and then she nodded. “Leonora Hampton Smith, it can only be her. She is the only young woman living here right now” 

Thran did cock his head and there was a curious gleam in his eye. “She was awfully young for such a nice home? Did somebody pay for her” 

Cayla nodded. “Yes, her father. He is a stock broker and has more money than the bank I guess. Leonora is an art student and he wanted her to have a nice place to live, in a safe neighbourhood.” 

Cayla did look visibly upset and Thran did put a hand on her shoulder, very soothingly. “Did you know her?”

Cayla nodded and made a grimace. “You must think I am some awfully soft hearted old goose but I did truly like her, most young girls these days are terribly shallow but Leonora was different, a real person. She had her own struggles poor thing, perhaps that was what caused this?”

Bard had gotten his note pad ready. “What sort of struggles?”

Cayla sat down on a chair and the two men did also sit down , the others there did disperse and the foyer became rather quiet. “She had problems with her weight poor thing, she tried to stay in control of it but couldn’t. She had such little faith in herself because of it, even if she was wonderfully talented” 

Bard did frown. “What sort of talent?” 

Cayla did wipe her nose, she was becoming increasingly emotional now that the shock wore off. “Oh she was a painter, she did paint a portrait of my grandson for me and it was wonderful. I just cannot believe that she is gone, that she would chose such a terrible solution” 

Bard nodded. “We would like to take a look at the apartment if you don’t mind?” 

Cayla nodded and got up again. “Of course, just follow me officers” 

She went to the elevators and they did enter one, Bard did notice that Leonora had lived on the top floor. The corridor they entered weren’t long, there were just three apartments there and they were all very large. Cayla did find some keys and managed to smile faintly. “One of the apartments is empty and has been for four months, then there is Mr Pete Darwin in number two and Leonora in number three” 

She walked over to a very elegant door and opened it, it had not been locked and Bard and Thran did exchange a glance. The girl hadn’t planned this very well, it did seem as if it was done in a fit of panic. The apartment was lovely, very light colours did dominate every room and one was transformed into a sort of work place. There were scaffolds and paintings and equipment everywhere and Bard had to admit that yes, she had to have been very talented indeed. Some of the paintings were just wonderful and Thran did walk over to one and frowned. “Look at this” 

Bard walked over and saw that the painting was only half finished, it was a painting of a horse and only the head and front legs were finished, the rest of the body had been drawn with chalk but hadn’t received any paint. Thran did walk over to the work bench, he did study it carefully and then he grasped a palette and smeared his finger across it. “This paint is almost dry, but not quite. She was painting earlier this morning, this is acrylics and they do dry fast” 

Bard frowned. “Really?” 

Thran nodded. “Earlier this morning this woman had purpose, she was going somewhere, she had plans. Then she walks up to the roof and throws herself to her death, a very unglamorous one too”

Bard swallowed hard. “You are saying?” 

Thran made a grimace. “She didn’t commit suicide, not the way we define the term. “ 

He turned to Bard. “Take a look at the bedroom” 

Bard did peek in through the door, the bedroom was very cosy and the bed was made and some clothes lay on it, as if she had been ready to get dressed for the day. There were flowers in a vase, they were fresh and there was a faint scent of perfume there. Thran nodded. “Tell me what you see” 

Bard winced. “Ah, you are a profiler, I am not?” 

Thran grinned. “Try, what does this make you feel? Does anything look out of the ordinary?”

Bard tried to think like a young lady and stared at the scene. “Uh, she hadn’t dressed yet? And it was rather late? “ 

Thran nodded. “She hadn’t dressed because she was expecting somebody, the nightgown she wore was an expensive one, and very elegant. There are fresh flowers here, perfume, there is a bottle of champagne in a cooler in the kitchen.” 

Bard hadn’t even noticed that and made a grimace, he should have seen that. “Yes, I think she was expecting somebody, a lover?”

Thran did walk to the door where Cayla did wait. “Do this building have surveillance of any sort?” 

Cayla nodded. “Of course, cameras everywhere.” 

Thran did look intense. “Then do show us please, I think this may solve the case” 

Bard stared at his partner with narrow eyes. “You are sure this wasn’t just a suicide?” 

Thran nodded. “Positive. Oh she did do the deep herself but I am willing to bet this month’s salary that something or someone did trigger her” 

Cayla did taken them down to an office and it did look almost like the control room of a casino, there were screens everywhere and Cayla did sit down and started typing. Some of the screens did come to life and they saw a picture of the corridor outside of Leonora’s apartment. It was empty and Bard saw that the time was six in the morning, Cayla did fast forward the recording, they saw naught. The corridor was empty but then, just minutes before the body hit the van the door to the apartment did fly open and a woman could be seen running. She wore just the nightgown and she did look as if she had received a most horrible shock, her eyes huge and dark and her body control bad. She did almost crash into the wall several times and even if there wasn’t any sound on the recording Bard could imagine her screaming and wailing, Thran was moving his lips slightly and staring intensely at the screen. “She is devastated, heart broken. That is a person having a complete emotional meltdown”

He turned to Cayla. “Is there access to the roof from that floor?”

Cayla nodded. “Yes, an emergency exit next to the elevators” 

Thran took a deep breath. “Let’s go, we have to check this roof” 

Cayla did show them the way once more and Bard cringed. The roof was covered with concrete and it was very rough, the girl had been barefoot and here were in fact bloody footprints for a few meters before the edge of the roof. Thran did look shocked. “She didn’t slow down. She didn’t hesitate, she just took the plunge. What in hells name did happen to her?” 

Bard swallowed hard. “Beats me!”

Thran sighed. “Let us return to the apartment, I bet we may find more clues there” 

Cayla did lend them the keys since they knew the way now and they entered the rooms once more. Bard saw that everything was very tidy and organized but not overly so, this wasn’t a person suffering from some OCD. There was fresh food in the fridge, some unpaid bills in a pile on her desk and plans in her notebook. She was scheduled for a meeting with a gallery owner the next day and she also had some other meetings they assumed were her friends. Also she had lectures almost every day and there were books about art history spread around the livingroom. Thran was intense. “She wasn’t planning on ending her life, she wasn’t depressed. This is the home of a person with no serious mental problems, she was shocked into doing it” 

Bard had to agree, nothing there spoke of any sort of sickness, or problems of any sorts. Thran did walk over to the desk, there was a laptop on it and it was on but locked with a password and he made a grimace. “Right, this is work for Elisa and Erestor. I bet we will find the answer on this machine” 

Bard nodded and bagged the laptop. They were about to enter the elevator and ask the CSI technicians to search through the apartment when Bard’s phone rang, it was Thor. His boss did sound a bit odd, almost choking and Bard frowned. “Bard? It is me, ah, I will send you a link but be warned, it is…unpleasant” 

Bard did look confused and when the phone beeped he did show the link to Thran who just nodded. “Go on, I wonder what this is about?” 

The link was to an obscure website where people could share video’s youtube would decline and Bard had to swallow hard. Somebody had filmed the entire event, they saw how Leonora did appear at the edge of the roof, as if she was trying to run in thin air and she fell like a rock towards the van. Thran was hoarse. “Bard, the one filming this knew she would jump” 

Bard watched in horror as the body hit the van, he felt nauseous. “What?” 

Thran was a bit pale. “The way it was filmed, the focus, everything. It was planned, set up. The camera didn’t lose sight of her even once and filmed even before she appeared at the top of the building. The one filming this knew what would happen!”

Bard felt a sinking feeling, the video showed Leonora’s body spread out on top of the van, the driver and the shop owner backing away, it was all shown in great detail. This was no cell phone camera but a real one, a good one too. There was text showing up on the screen and Bard let out a small whimper. “FAT HOES FLY!”

Thran saw it and his eyes got huge. “Oh fuck!” 

Bard just nodded. “I couldn’t have said it better myself!”

Thran was almost spinning around himself. “Hurry, we have to get this laptop opened, I have a terrible feeling here” 

Bard did run into the elevator and pushed the button frenetically. “How come?” 

Thran was panting. “Hoes Bard, hoes, not hoe!”

Bard felt his stomach drop. “Ah shit, plural”

Thran nodded. “He has either done this before or he is going to do it again, we have a serial killer on our hands” 

Bard closed his eyes, then he did focus and grasped his phone again, rang Elisa. “Elisa? It is me, Bard, do me a favour, check if there has been any unusual suicides lately, young females, overweight? Check the entire city, heck, check the country!”

Elisa mumbled something affirmative and Bard did hang up. Thran took a deep breath. “The link, was there any descriptions in it?” 

Bard opened it again, the account was a temporary one and anonymous and he already knew that this particular website was infamous for allowing almost everything, even illegal content. Thran was intense. “Go to the main page and do a search”

Bard clicked into the website’s main page and it was slow to load, the cell phone didn’t have that much juice. “Search for fat hoes with large letters” 

Bard stared at him. “No? He cannot have….” 

Thran sent him a stiff grin. “Only one way to find out” 

Bard did punch in the search words and one more video did appear, from another account but the quality of the shot did reveal that it was the same sort of camera. They saw a narrow road which had to be somewhere outside of the city, it was crossing a railway and Bard cringed, the shot did catch the headlights of an oncoming freight train and then something suddenly came running into the lights and they did in fact hear the sound of the locomotive’s breaks and the blaring of a horn. The person got hit and flew through the air like a ragdoll and hit a wall next to the rails with a sickening thud. Thran closed his eyes, the text appeared again, unchanged from the last video. Bard felt his hands tremble. “That is….” 

Thran just breathed. “Horrible!” 

They had reached the foyer and exited the building, the technicians were on their way up but Bard didn’t think they would find anything. There was no sign of any other person in the apartment than Leonora. Thran did stop by the car and his eyes were dark. “This will not end here Bard, I can feel it. This person is ruthless, heartless and convinced that he is in his right to do this”

Bard petted the laptop. “So you think this is someone who targets obese girls?” 

Thran nodded. “Most certainly, God alone knows why” 

Bard winced. “The first video had already gotten several thousand hits” 

Thran sent him a sad grin. “There is no end to human depravity I fear” 

\---------------------------------------

They were met by Elisa at the station, she was clearly upset and she had an expression on her face which spoke of disgust and disbelief. “I found two, a girl who got hit by a train a month ago and another who was killed by a speeding truck two months ago”

Bard nodded. “We have already seen the train incident yes, it was on the web. “ 

Elisa took a deep breath. “The truck incident was captured by a security camera and uploaded by some moron working in the bank where the camera was mounted, it got almost twenty thousand hits and look at this!!”

She turned her screen towards them and in the line of comments there were suddenly three well known words. Thran sighed. “And there the culprit got the idea for filming the deaths, he is seeking attention” 

Bard handed over the laptop. “Please, you must get this opened, asap. This culprit works on a time scale, one month between each victim.” 

Elisa did grasp the laptop and plugged it into a power source, then she did turn it on and the box asking for a password did appear. She tilted her head. “This person wasn’t very careful, it is a standard security program and I bet I can crack this one in no time.” 

She did plug an USB unit into the laptop and letters and numbers started to fly by at a startling rate. “It is a very clever program, it senses if the computer does recognize a certain letter or number and it can usually crack a normal password relatively easy.”

A line of letters started to form and Bard read it out loud. “Fluffykitty87?”

The password box did disappear and a welcome did flash by before the usual desktop icons did show up. Elisa did look up at them. “So?”

Thran did wet his lips. “Check the email”

Elisa opened the email and stared at a long row of mails, most were from what appeared to be galleries and some were from other students. There were also a few there from the school and some spam but nothing which could explain Leonora’s sudden suicide. Thran pointed at one of the mails. “That appears to be a close friend of hers”

Elisa opened the mail which was titled. “How you doing girl?” 

It was just text, from someone named Christine and it was held in a very joyful tone. “Hi there gorgeous, how’s it going? Gotten any yet? Oh don’t try to lie to me Leonora, I know what you have been up to, I am so glad for you. But do tell me more, who is he? Is he handsome? I am dying to find out girl, don’t keep your cards so close to your chest. I’ll see you tomorrow at the lecture. Love C” 

Bard stared at the mail. “Christine Woodstem? Should we ask her to come to the station?” 

Thran nodded. “Yes, she knows something. I will make a few calls, the school is not far from here and I bet I can get the headmaster to send her over asap” 

Bard sat down and stared at the laptop, some people lived their entire lives through such devices and he was a bit shocked by it and also very worried. Neither of his kids were allowed to use the computer they had at home unsupervised and they didn’t even have a facebook account. There had been some complaining but they had understood when Bard explained the dangers and traps one could encounter out on the world wide web. 

It too a little more than an hour, then a crying young woman was being escorted into one of the interrogation rooms by one of the female officers. The girl was a petite thing with long auburn hair, a pair of striking grey eyes and a heart shaped face. Bard did present himself to her and she did sniff and tried to act dignified but it was clear that she was in shock. “Please, tell me it isn’t true? Leonora cannot be dead? I spoke to her two days ago!!” 

Bard sighed “I am afraid it is true, she did commit suicide this morning” 

Christine was pale. “Oh Jesus Christ, why? She had no problems? She was going to get a place at a good gallery, her work at the school top notch?”

Thran was standing behind the one way mirror to evaluate the girl’s reactions and she was honest, she was truly shocked and grieving. Bard swallowed hard. “Christine, we need to know more about her, did she date?” 

Christine nodded. “Oh God, yes, she didn’t want to tell anybody but she did. You see, she has suffered for so long because of her…weight problem and believed that nobody would ever like her and then….”

She sniffled and Bard did hand over some tissues. “Yes, go on?” 

Christine tried to smile. “I wasn’t supposed to know you see, but I did catch a glimpse of something on her laptop. And she suddenly started acting differently, she was glowing man, being completely radiant and only a girl in love does act like that.”

Bard nodded. “What did you see?” 

Christine made a grimace. “A dating site, for people with weight problems. Bootylicious babes or something like that.” 

Bard had to sigh, perfect! It was probably the sort of site where no tracks could be found and the users were protected by firewalls thicker than the great wall of China. Christine did sob. “Did…did somebody from that site make her do this?” 

Bard tried to smile. “That is what we are trying to find out!”

He turned to Thran who left the room and ran to Elisa’s office. She was busy searching through the log on Leonora’s laptop and nodded when Thran mentioned the web site. “I have found it already, it isn’t one of those kinky sites, but a really serious one, trying to connect people who otherwise would struggle with their love life. “

She opened the site and Thran did see many pictures of mostly women who were from slightly overweight to morbidly obese. There were also statements from happy customers who told about their success stories and the happiness they had found. Bard did join them, he had sent Christine on her way after having given her his phone number and a strict order to call if she did remember something else. 

Elisa was scrolling through the page. “You have to be a registered member to gain access to the chat, and you do have a private mailbox too. I bet Leonora’s does contain the reason behind her suicide.” 

Bard frowned. “Can you access it?” 

Elisa shook her head. “Nope, the passwords are stored in a central computer. I think we have to call the company behind the site and demand that they open her account to us” 

Thran nodded. “I will do that, I can be very demanding if I have to. In the meanwhile, bring up the files for all three suicides we know about so far, we have to compare them for similarities. It could be that this bastard does target certain traits.” 

Thran ran off to make the call and Elisa got busy again. She switched to her own computer and started searching and before long they had the case files for the two previous suicides. Both had been ruled as accidental deaths and thus little had been done but there were some pictures there and Bard sighed. “Oh yes, he has a type for sure, beyond doubt!”

Elisa nodded. “Young, no more than twenty five, medium height, not morbidly obese but clearly overweight, dark hair and dark eyes and a pale complexion, this has to mean something!”

Bard sat down. “You can bet your ass it does, search the archives for deaths which involve women like that, don’t bother with age. I think this guy has experienced something which has turned him into a monster” 

Thran did return, he had a dark expression on his face and a triumphant although wicked grin around his mouth. “They agreed, after I did threaten them with a huge law suit and accusations of trafficking. Some of the profiles there are clearly of minors”

He did show Elisa a note and she did type in the words on it. A picture of Leonora did show up, she was smiling and leaning against a tree, looking very happy. Bard sighed. “She was a pretty girl, too bad she didn’t understand this. “

Thran made a grimace “Today being overweight means that you are worth less as a human being, you may be regarded as weak, flawed, disgusting. It is horrible really!”

Bard nodded and Elisa did find the mailbox and opened it. The mails were sorted by date, the oldest ones first and she blinked. “Look here, this sounds promising” 

Bard and Thran did lean forward and stared at the screen. “Hello there you gorgeous thing, where have you been all of my life?” 

Bard cringed and Thran made a grimace. “Smooth, did she answer?” 

Elisa nodded. “Yes, I think this may be the one, there are more than three weeks of chats and mails in here” 

She scrolled down, very fast and her face got more and more intense. “Look here? He is playing on her insecurities like a master handles a violin, see?” 

Bard did read it out loud. “You are beautiful, any man would be happy to be with you, can’t you see you are precious?”

Thran grimaced, he did look disgusted. “She is being groomed, prepared. He is trying to make her love him, adore him. He wants to utterly destroy her” 

The texts became increasingly intimate and Elisa pointed at the time registered by each mail and chat. “She was online with him almost twenty four seven over the last week, the language is that of lovers, very intimate” 

Thran did read a little and he did look a bit red in the face. “Oh I see, for sure. Hmm, he has certainly gotten her hooked” 

Bard had to swallow, the text was so sugary sweet it almost made him gag but to an insecure girl it had to be heavenly, a sign that somebody did care and find her attractive in spite of it all. Thran took a deep breath. “Go to the end.” 

Elisa did scroll down, there was just one entry and it had arrived precisely five minutes before Leonora did dive off the roof. It was a huge file and Thran did stop Elisa from opening it. “I don’t think we all should see this, seriously. I fear that this content may be harmful in many ways” 

Bard nodded. “Alright, you want to watch it alone?`” 

Thran nodded. “Yes, I can deal with it, I don’t think you can.” 

Bard felt conflicted but nodded. “You are right, I should probably stay away from this. Elisa?” 

She cringed. “Yeah, me too. I have seen a lot of shit believe me but…no, I don’t want to see this. She was a lovely girl, I want to think of her like that” 

She got up and left the room and Bard did follow her. Thran sat down and braced himself, he had trained for such events but he did doubt that he was ready. Still he had to do it and his hand was shaking as he pressed the button and opened the mail. 

 

A quarter of an hour later he did join Elisa and Bard outside of the room, he was grey in the face, crying and shaking all over and Bard did embrace him. “That bad?” 

Thran gasped. “Oh God, I have watched that file three times, I cannot describe the evil of this person. In just three minutes he…he ruined everything she was Bard, her new found confidence, her feeling of worth, her every hope and dream. There was even porn in it, ghastly images of some terribly obese women with her face photoshopped onto them. He was explaining what he would do to her, in detail. There was even one image of a woman and a…miniature donkey!! He called her a worthless fat whore and said that she was too disgusting to touch.” 

Bard had never seen Thran this affected before, this broken. “He knew exactly what triggers to push, what to say and show. She must have felt utterly crushed, it was the most cruel thing I have ever encountered” 

Bard couldn’t say anything but Elisa did stare at them, she was glaring. “Well, there is just one thing to do!” 

Bard lifted his head. “What do you mean?” 

Elisa did cross her arms over her chest. “First, check if the other two were on the same page and then turn the hunter into prey” 

Thran did wipe his face and Bard embraced him, he hated to see his beloved so distraught. “You are speaking of creating a false profile aren’t you?” 

Elisa did nod and her eyes were dark. “Yes, Erestor is not only an excellent hacker, he can also create some very lifelike avatars. It shouldn’t be any problem creating a person who would be irresistible to this creep” 

Bard took a deep breath. “Alright, let’s check the names of the two previous ones and then we take it from there.” 

Elisa did enter the main page again and started searching for names, there was a function there called “Found love” and it did show the profile image of those members who had found someone through the page. Bard cussed, both were there and had hooked up with different names but it had to be the same person. “He has more than one profile” 

Thran did look tired. “He is shaping his profile according to the target, he is sly!”

Bard looked at Elisa. “Can he be tracked back to his own computer?”

Elisa made a grimace and shrugged. “I hardly think so, he is most likely using a laptop and entering the open wifi of some public building. He is smart” 

Thran did lean his head onto Bard’s shoulder and he took a deep breath. “We have to make a profile and fast. He may be looking for a new target already” 

Bard did slide his fingers through the long blonde hair and he bent over and kissed Thran’s forehead. Elisa did grin. “Sometimes you guys are just so sugary sweet!”

Bard grinned and then he did embrace Thran again. “The culprit, he doesn’t rape the victims, there doesn’t seem to be anything sexual in it at all?” 

Thran straightened himself up. “Oh but there is, it is just twisted. He never meets them face to face, but yet he is intimate with them over the web and the videos of their last moments? I bet that is what does it for him.”

Elisa did turn pale. “Oh God, do you really suggest that he is watching them die and …you know…polishing the door knob?” 

Thran had an intense look in his eyes. “The culprit is male, probably between twenty and forty years of age, Caucasian and he is not very social. I would say that he probably lacks the ability to interact with others in a normal manner. He isn’t stupid at all, I would say that he is above average intelligence and he is strategic and systematic.” 

Bard had to grin. “And there the profiler kicked inn” 

Elisa did tilt her head. “But why does he do it? Why does he kill women like that?” 

Thran did sigh and released his grip around Bard’s waist. “There could be many reasons I bet, but I think he must have had a traumatic experience of some kind, which involved a woman like that” 

Elisa cringed. “Oh , the search. I did start a search for deaths involving women who fits their description.” 

She ran over to the office computers and checked, the search was still moving along and she sighed. “There are just too many deaths to search through, this may take a while.”

Bard nodded. “We are going to get something to eat, could you call Erestor and ask him to make a profile? “ 

Elisa did pull out her phone. “On it, I will call if the search engine finds something”

Bard did pull Thran after him and the blonde did still look a bit shaken, Bard wondered if he would be able to get through this. They headed for the café right over the street and got a huge sandwich each. Thran did eat but reluctantly and Bard knew the look in his eyes. He was angry, and he was never himself when he was in that mood. Bard did take his hand. “Relax, put it aside. We are doing what we can remember?” 

Thran took a deep breath. “I know, it is just…I cannot even begin to describe how this makes me feel, that beast is targeting vulnerable people Bard, those who already struggle. It is…sick!”

Bard nodded. “Yes, and we will catch him, don’t doubt that for a second. Eat now, the food is too good to go to waste” 

Thran just sent him a pale grin and continued nibbling at his sandwich. Bard sighed and ordered a huge cup of black coffee. He needed that now, or rather, he needed a huge shot of whiskey but he was at work and Thor would throw a tantrum if anybody showed up at the office drunk. They finished the meal and then they returned to the office, Elisa was sitting by the desk still and the search was still running. She did yawn. “Erestor is gonna have the profile ready tomorrow morning.” 

Bard raised an eyebrow. “That fast?” 

She grinned. “He is efficient and promised to put everything else aside since it is such a disgusting case” 

Thran smiled warmly. “Bless him, what now?” 

Bard shrugged. “We wait, if Judith haven’t got anything special for us I guess we can return to the good old paperwork. There are reports to be made” 

Thran moaned but he did smile a bit. “Great, paperwork, just what I need now” 

Bard did squint for a second. “There is one thing which puzzles me though” 

Thran did grin. “Just one? Then you are truly a lucky man” 

Bard rolled his eyes. “Ha ha ha, very funny. How did he know she was going to jump to her death?” 

Thran sighed. “The last thing written in the message he sent her asked her to jump off the roof and spare the world from her presence. When a person is that upset and broken it becomes almost like a command, they will do it for it will seem as the only way out” 

Bard closed his eyes. “Goddamn bastard! I wish I could….” 

Thran nodded. “Me too!”

Both of them sat down to work on the reports and Thor did drop by, telling that the technicians hadn’t found anything there which indicated that somebody had visited Leonora. But they had found flowers and other gifts and the cards had been pre-printed and weren’t traceable. The flowers had come from florists all over the city and there had even been a box of very exclusive chocolate delivered at her door once. The killer had really done his very best to make her trust him and love him. Thran was sure that if there ever were a psychopath this was it, a real monster. 

They didn’t mention the case at all when they returned home for the evening, it was the rule. Work was left behind when they left the office. The kids were busy, Tilda had taken up ballet and was showing off her new moves and Sigrid had promised to visit a friend. Bain was out fixing some fences with Legolas and Jean was cooking as always. She had some days off work and even though her days did consist of cooking she never got tired of it. Bard and Thran did take a long ride before the nigh fell and then they had a hot bath and when they did retire for the evening Thran was unusually clingy and needy. Bard knew he tried to drain himself of the darkness they had encountered and didn’t mind at all, he liked it when his beloved was passionate and he did willingly participate in some rather hefty love making. 

The next morning Jean sent the kids off to school and Thran and Bard had a quick breakfast. Bard knew he would be limping for much of the day, but he didn’t mind it at all. Thran was in a good mood and that was what mattered the most. They got to the office on time which was a minor event in itself since traffic usually got gridlocked rather fast. The main roads leading into the city weren’t made for modern traffic at all.   
Elisa was already in place, she was grinning. “Ah, there you are, the brave knights, defenders of fallen maidens and defeaters of dragons” 

Bard did roll his eyes and Thran did raise an eyebrow. She giggled. “Sorry, I spent last night watching a movie about King Arthur, a really old one, I haven’t heard that much thou and thee and thus for a very long time” 

Bard laughed. “Alright, so, anything new?” 

Elisa turned her screen around. “Guys, say hi to Samantha Beck, she is a girl originally from Canada, she is studying French literature at the university, has a BMI of 32 and haven’t dared to date anyone in years” 

They stared at a picture of a girl who was very convincing. She was sweet but could have been gorgeous if she had lost weight and she did look shy. The gaze was vulnerable and she had a sort of forced smile. Elisa was rubbing her hands together. “Erestor gave her features from all the three previous victims, she ought to be the ideal target for that sick fucker” 

Thran did cock his head. “Those photos are astonishing, it is really just a computer generated thing?” 

Elisa nodded. “He can make images you couldn’t separate from real ones. You would need a special program to reveal them as fake and I don’t think Mr Nasty does suspect anything” 

Bard took a deep breath. “Is the profile out there already?” 

Elisa nodded. “It was activated one hour ago, now we just have to wait for the fish to take the bait” 

Thran did grin and the grin was vicious. “Yes, hook line and sinker” 

They had to return to the reports and as they were working on them there was a ping coming from Elisa’s computer. She jumped up and ran to it with glee. “Ah, the search, it has come up with something, finally!”

Bard and Thran did also run over to the computer and Elisa did open the file. It did show a burned down house and it seemed as if it had exploded. It was an old case, twenty years old as a matter of fact and there were images of the one victim of the fire. A woman in her early twenties who did look almost identical to Leonora, Elisa did read through the file at lightning speed. “Ah this was in the neighbouring county, in some little town to the west. They say that the house got blown up due to a gas leak. The owner of the house did die in the blast” 

She showed them an image, it was a body, badly charred and laying face down on a lawn. “She got ejected from the house, they said she flew through the air like some missile”

Bard had to stare, it was grotesque and Thran did nod. “No coincidence, fat hoes fly remember?” 

Elisa did read on. “The lady was a local baby sitter, she did watch the neighbourhood kids and she was well known for being a bit promiscuous but she never did anything which made people stop trusting her. “ 

Thran frowned “What was her name?”

Elisa did make a grimace. “Gertrude, I mean, what the fuck? Who names their daughter Gertrude?!” 

Thran had to grin. “Someone who is fond of Wagner? Jokes aside, she fits the profile, I bet the murderer had a connection to her” 

Elisa nodded. “Look, there was only one witness to the explosion. A fifteen year old boy named Duke Wainslow. He was in shock and the police wasn’t interrogating him at all, he had just been walking by when the house blew up. At least, that was what he said” 

Thran frowned. “Does the file say anything else?” 

Elisa shook her head. “No, it was deemed as a tragic accident and that was it.” 

Thran did look intense. “Do a search for this Duke please, I have a feeling here” 

Elisa did punch in the name and started searching and before long the police archives did come up with a person by that name. They stared at a man with a very odd look, he had a narrow head with eyes which seemed to bulge a bit, a crooked nose and very large front teeth and Bard had to grin. “Place a pair of long ears on that one and you have a bunny” 

Thran scoffed “Maybe, but he is perhaps our target.” 

Elisa did read out loud. “Arrested no less than ten times? The first time when he was sixteen for having strangled the neighbour’s dog, then he has been in and out of jail for years, mostly for theft and harassment. There is also one case here of identity theft. “

Thran raised a hand. “Bingo, there we have it. He is the one, any idea of where he is now?”

Elisa did search but nothing came up. “There is nada, he could be anywhere. We have to trust the profile we set up.” 

Bard tilted his head a bit. “Know what, he did kill that woman, Gertrude. I am sure of it. But why?!”

Elisa did tap her finger at the screen. “Gertrude has a living relative, a sister. She lives in Branton, it is two hours from here. Her name is Hildegard Darling.” 

Thran burst out into laughter. “Ah didn’t I say it, their parents did love Wagner.” 

Bard had to giggle. “So shall we visit this Valkyrie then? Ask about her sisters death?” 

Thran did nod. “Yes, it ought to be interesting.” 

Bard shook his head and went to inform Thor and get the all clear and then they were on their way. Branton was a small town and easy to find but the address was something else and they drove around for a good forty minutes before they found the right street. The one doing the planning when this town was established had probably been playing around with letter crackers for the names were impossible to pronounce. Most had no more than one or two vowels. The street Hildegard Darling lived in was a nice one with neatly trimmed lawns and white fences, it was rather idyllic but Thran sort of grimaced. “These neighbourhoods are the worst, there are always secrets when things look this nice.” 

Bard just grinned and walked up to the door, he had his police badge ready and then they got the shock of the day. With a name like that they expected the woman to look like something out of a Wagner opera, large, blonde and impressive. She was probably the smallest woman they had seen, barely more than four feet two and she was so doll like she barely seemed real. Bard did present them and she frowned, she was very pretty and she appeared to be way younger than her true age. “You want to know more about my sister? Why?” 

Bard did swallow. “Well, we have reason to suspect that somebody who knew her has started killing women who resemble her” 

Hildegard did stare at them, then she swore, in broad Irish and it made Bard wince. “Goddamn fekkin gobshite, it is that Duke kid isn’t it, bloody pervert!”

Thran did frown. “Do explain please?” 

Hildegard did almost sneer. “She was babysitting that kid for some years and he had a crush on her, a serious one. Could have been cute if it wasn’t for the fact that it wasn’t. He loved to spy on her while she was in the bathroom and he would take out his pecker and play with it when she was around. He did even sneak into her bedroom once and she woke up to find him standing by her bed, masturbating.” 

Thran did look intrigued. “So he was attracted to her?” 

Hildegard did nod, her eyes were dark. “He was possessive, she tried to explain that she wasn’t interested but he didn’t listen. She told me he would show up at the weirdest moments and try to talk her into sleeping with him. Once he did even try to rape her but she managed to fight him off and she said he never would have been able to go through with it, he didn’t have a boner” 

Thran let out a hiss, his eyes did reveal some sort of moment of enlightenment. Bard stared at him. “What?” 

Thran did take a deep breath. “Duke did kill her, beyond any doubt. And he blew the house up to hide it. “ 

Hildegard did nod. “I have always suspected that but who would think that a tiny fifteen years old boy could kill an adult woman. My sister wasn’t small you know”

Thran made a grimace. “Do not underestimate the power of desperation. Duke did try to rape her again, I am pretty sure of it. But he couldn’t do it, he didn’t manage to get an erection and that made him so mad and disappointed he killed her instead and then he had to hide the evidence.” 

Bard did look a bit shocked. “Are you saying that he is impotent?” 

Thran nodded. “Yes, most certainly”

Hildegard made a grimace. “Listen, there is this old doctor here in town, he used to be the local paediatrician and I do know that Duke’s mother did take him to see Dr Roberts a few times, she refused to say why” 

Bard did grin. “Wonderful, where does he live?” 

Hildegard did find a post it note and described the way and she did ensure them that the old doctor would help if they described the situation. Bard did promise to call her as soon as they caught the bastard and they drove off in a hurry. They had to reach the doctor’s office before it did close for the day. Dr Roberts proved to be a very old man, in his eighties but he was still working since he was very healthy and he didn’t feel his age at all. He did listen to them and then he did find some old files and started to go through them. “Ah, Duke! I knew that one was trouble from the moment he was born, there as just something odd about that kid!” 

He did find the right file and put it on the table. “I do remember that his mom brought him here, I think he was ten at the time” 

He put on some glasses and started to read. “Yes, I was right. He was ten, and he suffered from a very tight foreskin, it had become inflamed.” 

Bard winced, the very idea…. Thran did nod. “It is very painful, what did you do?” 

Dr Roberts did made a grimace. “I prescribed antibiotics and a strict regime of cleanliness. I couldn’t do anything until the infection was gone but the mother didn’t listen to me, she was one of a kind that woman, head strong and very stubborn and worse even, she didn’t really trust modern medicine at all” 

Bard sort of shrank back into his seat. “Dear lord, don’t tell me….” 

Dr Roberts did sigh. “She did circumcise the lad, with a scissor. He did bleed so badly I was called to their home to cauterize the wound and it was the worst botched job I had ever seen. There was major damage.” 

Bard nodded. “That may explain his inability to…ah…perform” 

Dr Roberts did put his glasses down. “Yes, I doubt that he would be able to maintain an erection for very long, there was so much scar tissue I think intercourse would be painful unless he had surgery to fix the problem” 

Thran was a bit pale and so was Bard, it was easy to feel sorry for somebody who had suffered through such a horrible thing. Dr Roberts sent them a sad smile. “Duke was the sort of kid who tears the wings of flies or sets cats on fire. I am not surprised that he has become a criminal, that family were so inbred their family tree had only one branch!”

Thran had to grin and Bard did shake the old doctors hand. “Thank you for the help, it is greatly appreciated.” 

Dr Roberts did smile and for a moment the friendly old face got very hard. “Don’t hesitate when it comes to this one, Duke is bad news. He is better off locked away with the keys thrown into Mt St Helens.” 

The two men did stare at each other when they returned to the car, Thran did look as if he had tasted something disgusting. “Well, at least we now know his trigger”

Bard started the cruiser. “What do you mean?” 

Thran smiled, the smile became wider and wider and almost ugly. “What will drive him mad, make him lose his mind” 

Bard frowned. “Ah, are you telling me that…” 

Thran nodded vigorously. “Yes, the sweet girl he is about to seduce is going to expose him for what he is, if that doesn’t make him act irrationally then nothing will” 

Bard chuckled. “Yeah, that ought to sting, a lot!”

 

When they did return to the station Erestor was there with Elisa, the tall dark haired man was sitting by the desk typing and Elisa was beaming. “He answered, he took the bait. Now Erestor is trying to chat him up.” 

Bard did look at Erestor with suspicion. “Are you sure you can be convincing, you have to convince this creep that he is chatting and mailing with an obese girl in her twenties who is painfully shy and naïve” 

Erestor did crack his knuckles. “Don’t worry. I have programs which help me and I do have a sister, she knows how people talk these days and what’s hot or not” 

Elisa grinned from one ear to the other. “He uses the same pick up lines each time I think, it is as if he is using a sort of textbook” 

Bard frowned. “Maybe he is, there are plenty of books about dating out there, with pickup lines galore. “

He stared at Thran. “How much time do we give him?”

Thran sat down. “Two weeks, by then he ought to be sure about his grip on her, he will be convinced that she is his completely” 

Erestor chuckled. “Two weeks it is, by then she will be completely smitten by him, she will tell him everything about herself, even her address” 

Thran did look a bit nervous. “Really? Is that smart?” 

Erestor did pout. “Doh, if he is to come for her he has to know where she is right? We will be waiting, to create the worst surprise party ever”

Thran nodded. “Right, just don’t revel too much right away, hold back, play shy, tease him” 

Erestor did grin with the tip of his tongue between his teeth. “Oh you bet I can tease, I am the king of teasing. He will think that she is the perfect target” 

Bard took a deep breath. “Right, you do have time for this Erestor?”

He nodded. “Sure, I live my life in front of the screen each day anyhow, why not live somebody else’s life for once? I think I could have made a fine woman don’t you too?” 

Elisa did burst into a fit of laughter. “The very best Erestor, the very best.” 

 

Over the next days Erestor did chat with the culprit quite often, he did hold back and that probably made Duke even more set upon this one. Erestor did create new images he uploaded, he did share details about this person’s personal life with the man on the other end of the wires and it often ended with Erestor howling with laughter. He did pull over Elisa once, to show something Duke had written. He did call himself Da-man online and he had written that he owned a huge cattle ranch and that he was breeding Arabian horses. Erestor had mentioned just coincidentally to love horses and Duke had swallowed that lie whole. He was indeed shaping his own profile to fit with his intended victim. The profile image he had used was of a man who did have a few pounds too many but he was still handsome and Erestor had managed to trace the picture back to an open picture database. Duke had just removed the watermark from the photo and presented it as himself.

Thran had found out that Duke had been released from prison just a month before the first murder, he had been in and out of jail almost constantly and for some reason he had discovered the web page and there he had probably found the means to fulfil his fantasies. 

 

Bard and Thran were working on some other cases while Erestor was grooming their serial killer, they did pay close attention to the development and Elisa did keep them updated all the time. The things Erestor did say would sometimes make them writhe with laughter or wince and he had created this whole sad backstory and a childhood with bullying and eating disorders. After a week the chatting was going on every day and Erestor was very careful not to seem too eager, instead he did make it sound as if he had second thoughts and then Duke would use everything he had learned about the girl to keep her talking. It was truly devious. Thran did find an apartment which fitted the description Erestor gave, it was in a good neighbourhood and the police did own some apartments there which were reserved for retired police officers. They did arrange it so the apartment did look as if it was inhabited and the neighbours were warned too. They were more than happy to help and before long the apartment did look very cosy and inviting. 

After two weeks it was clear that Duke was a firm believer in this woman and that he was ready to take it to the next level, he started talking about meeting her, about marriage and he sent gifts to the apartment every day. Erestor was told what gifts had arrived and thanked Duke profusely and the language became more and more romantic and intimate. Thran and Bard were preparing the final part of the operation now. Erestor had discovered that Duke indeed did move around with no fixed IP address and he was impossible to track but the constant movements and the fact that he wasn’t registered on any address made them realize that he was living in his car. Now they had people spying all the time and a white medium sized van were seen in the neighbourhood a few times. He was probably trying to determine where to place the camera which was to capture her last minutes and Thran had hired a body guard he knew to pretend to be her. He would be dressed up in a fat suit and placed inside of the apartment, and from a distance it ought to be believable enough. At least “she” was seen and the house didn’t look empty. 

The day they were to drop the bomb so to speak was busy, they had placed their own people in all of the apartments, they had snipers on the roofs of the other buildings and a helicopter was on standby. Bard and Thran were at the apartment, they were waiting and Elisa and Erestor had to do the final part of the job. Thran had already prepared a file to send to Duke and it was nasty, it ought to send him into a frenzy right away. 

Erestor was grinning like mad when he hit send and the file flew off like a guided missile, guaranteed to create havoc. Thran had written it very carefully, first of all, she did reject him for she had found somebody else, someone worthy of her. Second of all, she had seen through his lies, he was probably just a bum and a looser. And third and not least, she was sure he had a tiny excuse for a cock and that he couldn’t fuck even if his life depended on it. It should do the trick. 

It did. There was no answer, just one word. “Bitch!” and then silence, Erestor did clap his hands and Elisa did call Bard. “He is on his way, stand by” 

Bard and Thran had hidden themselves inside of the apartment and the body guard was there too, with the fat suit and makeup and a wig, and he had put on this completely ridiculous piece of lingerie which did show that the voluptuous body was fake. He wore a bullet proof suit under it and was armed and Thran was rather convinced that the sight would make Duke lose it completely. 

There was silence, some lights were on but not all and the body guard had placed himself in the sofa, apparently reading a book but he had a Glock hidden underneath it and Bard and Thran was standing in a closet just a few feet from the entrance. There were police officers everywhere in the building and they were ready if there were any problems. Half an hour went by, then they heard the sound of a speeding car and screeching wheels and a car door did slam hard. The snipers on the roof saw the guy clearly but they wouldn’t shoot unless they had to, they just made sure that they had him targeted the whole time. The apartment had huge windows which covered the entire façade and the curtains were pulled back, it gave them a full view of the apartment and they wore night vision equipment in case the lights went out. This was one bastard who wasn’t going to get away with his crimes. 

The body guard was professional. A friend of Dwalin and he had seen combat many times, he was as calm as a cucumber but Bard was sweating. So much could go wrong, what if the madman was armed? They had no idea of what sort of weapons he could bring. There was a slight buzz in their earplugs and one of the men on the roof did whisper. “He is inside, carries an axe and what appears to be a crowbar”

Bard let out a sigh of relief, it was dangerous weapons but it wasn’t firearms. There was a sudden crash and the door fell inwards, shaken off its hinges. The man who stormed into the apartment was red in the face and his eyes were bulging even worse than before, he was almost foaming at the mouth. Thran had prepared one last surprise for Duke, the walls of the apartment was covered with pictures of male genitalia, all prime specimens and then there was this huge picture of a very tiny one with the word Duke Limpcock written all over it. He stormed into the living room and stopped, staring at the walls with huge eyes and that was when the body guard did get up from the couch, flinging the hair back and purring. “Don’t you like it honey? I am completely sure the picture is exaggerating its size but it was the smallest we could find”

“She” was wriggling her hips and pouting and even a blind man could see that this was a huge burly guy dressed as a girl. Duke screamed, a wild piercing wail of wrath and he lifted the crowbar and ran towards the bodyguard who very calmly lifted the Glock. “Ah-ah loser, drop that or I will drop you!”

The two officers did step out from the closet with guns drawn and the door was suddenly filled with an entire Swat team. Duke let out another roar and he spun around himself, the eyes did reveal sheer madness. Several red dots did appear on his chest and he did shriek once more and then he attacked the wall. He was tearing into the images, screaming insults to somebody who could only have been Gertrude, accusing her of making him impotent and the soldiers from the Swat team did take him down with ease. They just put cuffs on him and pulled a hood over his head and he was hissing and spitting like an angry cobra. Bard did holster his gun, he was glad he hadn’t had to use it and Thran did sigh. “I don’t think he will go to jail, he is just too deranged. They will lock him up in intensive care at the mental hospital and keep him there”

Bard frowned. “Are you sure?” 

Thran nodded and patted his back. “Yes, I will make it so. He will never see the light of day again as a free man” 

Bard shuddered. “And yet he managed to kill four people, innocent women” 

Thran nodded. “We cannot save everybody Bard, but we can save a few and we did save many today. He would have continued killing women for years to come”

Bard nodded. “Yes, but I may never forget the manner in which he murdered them.” 

Thran nodded. “Yes, by using their insecurities and their fear of rejection against them. He was inhuman, but now he is caught and good riddance. We did a good job this time. “ 

Bard nodded and kissed his husband. “Yes, and now let’s head back to HQ and tell Erestor and Elisa how this went down.” 

Erestor was laughing out loud, Elisa was almost in tears and the Swat team had filmed the whole séance and Thor stared at it and made a grimace. “Thran, that was wicked off you, no wonder why he snapped” 

Thran just sent his boss and innocent grin. “Oh the pictures? The only road to recovery from mental problems is through self-acceptance and truth and I did fix that didn’t I? He did see himself as what he truly was, a pathetic little pecker!”

Bard had to laugh and Thor did pat Thran over the back. “Remind me never to make you my enemy, this sort of mind games are for the experts alone” 

Thran did grin back. “Indeed they are.” 

 

Duke was put away, nobody had expected anything else. He was so confused and so crazy he was kept sedated for most of the time, and when he wasn’t he was yelling insults at every female who did show up near his cell. He was obviously blaming everyone for his inability to perform in bed and the psychologist at the site did give up on him. He was just not reacting to any sort of treatment. They did try one last attempt, with electrical shock therapy and it did seem to work for a few days but then he would relapse and scream out his hatred of dark haired voluptuous women.   
That made the employees go ahead and buy pin up posters from the forties and fifties, women with real curves and they did hang them everywhere and then they would stand back and watch him go berserk, unable to reach the images. None there had any sympathy for this man and five months after he was submitted he did try to chase one of the other patients down a flight of stairs. She was a rather robust woman who was suffering from some severe delusions and he had probably forgotten that being large doesn’t necessarily mean that you are weak. 

When he did try to push her she grasped him, lifted him and plunged him down the open space next to the staircase and that was it. Three stories down into concrete with his head first was a quick end although a terribly messy one. The woman was escorted off and calmed down and nobody blamed her. The body was removed, the floors cleaned and Duke became just a file in an archive. And that was just the fate he deserved.


	10. The great pretender

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thran and Bard does come across a case with a very surprising twist...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is very graphic with some nasty scenes. be warned.   
> I decided to write an extra long chapter because of Christmas, so every follower of this tale, a very merry christmas! May it bring you only joy and good things.

Chapter 10: The great pretender

 

Justine Combs was the expert, a person so dedicated to her profession she knew all the tricks within the book and then some. She was proud of her skills and did rejoice in the fact that nobody she had met had been able to compare to her. She was the master of this game, there was nobody above her and she was way ahead of everybody else. They were riff raff, aiming way to low, not daring to really go out there and shine. She had taken it to the next level and as long as she was so far ahead of everybody else there was little risk of being exposed and caught. 

She did take a look in the mirror, her make up was perfect, so was her outfit, nobody ought to question her identity. She blew a kiss at her reflection, made a well-rehearsed smile and sauntered out of the bathroom. Today she was the queen, number one, the winner.   
She hadn’t started off this bold, of course not. She had worked her way upwards from scratch, from a boring job in a firm which sold equipment for offices. Then she had discovered that there were opportunities out there, if you were bold enough and without scruples. Justine had never had those, she barely knew the meaning of the word. She knew one important person in this world and that was herself, period! At first she had gone for the easy tricks, picking out her targets carefully for she knew that this business was risky, but the benefits, oh the benefits. Her first “job” had earned her sixty grand in one go. She had entered a fast food restaurant and slipped on a piece of greased up paper, the result was a twisted knee or so the papers said and of course the restaurant did pay up right away. Rather that than going to court and risk losing more customers. 

Justine had tried it all, pretending to have been hit by cars, pretending to have been mugged, pretending to have food allergies and getting allergic reactions….She knew the art of suing people to the letter, and just who to target and when to strike. She had of course had a few set backs, one guy had exploded when she tried to make it look as if he had backed into her in a parking lot, he had blown all his fuses and she had been worried that he would kill her but somebody had luckily seen them and came to her rescue. Another time she had gotten hurt for real, she had twisted her ankle in a stairway and it had forced her to stay at home for two weeks. Which was money lost and she couldn’t bare the though. 

Over the last two years she had earned more than five millions on scams, and she was shameless. If it could bring money she did it, making elderly people pay up all their life’s savings for some made up cause was normal to her, after all, when they were that dumb they didn’t deserve any better. Insurance fraud was if not easy doable if you knew just how to work the system to the max, and she knew the system and how it worked down to the T.   
But she had upped her game a bit. Now she had entered the very lucrative world of identity theft and she had found that she loved it.   
Not only did she steal people’s private information like social security codes and card numbers but she did also try to live like them. It was a bit of a thrill really, a challenge to see if anybody could guess that she wasn’t the one she tried to be. Nobody had reacted this far and she had found that this was like a bottomless well, ready to be harvested. Getting credit cards in the names of others was just the very start of this, bank accounts and expensive cars the next thing to try and she had even been selling properties which didn’t even exist. She always made money, she had never done a job which didn’t pay off for she was the best and her acting skills and instinct always made people fall for her lies.   
She found the information she needed in people’s garbage, on the web, by simple old fashioned spying. You could buy pretty advanced equipment online, for a small money too if you knew where to look and she saw this as her job, as her profession. 

She walked by the lines of people waiting for their flights and picked up her Louis Vuitton baggage, making sure to uphold the illusion the whole time. She had picked a good target this time, a very famous actress who was well known for being a bit eccentric and odd. The actress was at the moment enjoying a long holiday in Hawaii with her twenty year younger boyfriend but that was a secret and thus Justine could take her place, for a few days. But that was all that she needed. She walked outside with her chin held high, the actress had the same body shape as her and with high heels and a wig the differences were there but not very obvious. She hailed a cab and waited for the cab driver to place her very expensive bags into the car for her. Then she did enter the car and gave the address to a famous hotel, the cabdriver appeared to be a bit star struck and his mouth did move a few times without him making even a sound. 

She arrived at the hotel smiling, this was the critical moment for her. She, or rather the actress, had been there before several times and Justine had studied the everyday life of the actress for several months. By now she knew all about her, her habits, her preferences, how she did treat others, what she usually preferred to eat and practically every little quirk the woman had. She sauntered up to the man working the reception and smiled, a suave smile which was a trademark of the actress. “Hello there Gordon, now how are you today?” 

The receptionist was making huge eyes for a few seconds, then he smiled back, a very professional smile. “I am very fine Ms Cloudfield, what may I do for you today?” 

She leaned towards the counter. “Ah, I have had such bad luck today, I was supposed to fly to Paris but alas, the photoshoot got cancelled and now I am practically stranded here, with my crew already there. Be a darling and check if my suite is available? I know I haven’t called ahead to check inn but you do know how it is don’t you darling? When one thing gets in the way everything has to be rescheduled.” 

The receptionist did smile, he did look a wee bit nervous but did check the computer and now he did smile for real. “Ah, good news Ms Cloudfield, the suite is ready. Should I send your bags up right away?” 

She nodded. “Of course darling, and call Mr Peters, I need some gowns and clothes and the rest of my stuff too, the rest of my wardrobe is unfortunately in Paris right now” 

The receptionist did bow his head and she walked towards the elevators as if she truly did belong there. The actress did live at this hotel for almost four months a year, she had a storage connected to the hotel where they kept many of her belongings and she did grin to herself as she took the elevator up to the suite. There was an unending demand for things which had belonged to celebrities and everything this woman had worn could be sold for ridiculous amounts of money online, anonymously of course. 

She entered the suite and waved her hand at the servant who already was standing there awaiting orders, it was a new one, thank goodness for that. She sat down elegantly and cocked her head. “Bill is it? Be a dear and get me some champagne, you know the type I prefer?” 

The servant nodded and returned with a glass, she did take a small sip of it, and she did have acting skills for this did taste like cat piss the way she saw it but she grinned and took another sip. “Perfect, thank you dear” 

The servant bowed deeply. “Was that all Ma’am?” 

She nodded. “Yes, I will call if I need some assistance. Now I want to rest, jet lag is such a drag” 

The servant sent her a very professional smile and Justine put down the glass and made a grimace the moment he left the room. She had the suite and access to Ms Cloudfield’s belongings for about two days before anybody would get suspicious, that was plenty of time to take advantage of this opportunity. She called down and ordered dinner, some ridiculously expensive dish made from an endangered fish which had to be imported from Korea and then she sat down to watch some TV. Mr Peters did arrive and since he had met Ms Cloudfield several times she hid in the bathroom and pretended to be having a shower. She just yelled through the door, ordering him to leave the clothes and everything and have some champagne before he left. 

That was exactly what Ms Cloudfield would do, and when Justine did exit the bathroom there were several long rows of clothes hanging from portable clothes racks. Some boxes of jewellery. Shoes, underwear, all sorts of accessories. Justine grinned, only a pair of shoes could bring her at least twenty grand, and a pair of nickers? Ah sweet lord, the perverts would be drooling over them. She was standing in the middle of a fortune. 

She opened her smart phone and made a list, only the really expensive stuff, things which had been seen, worn by Ms Cloudfield at least once. This would be sweet. She had her plans ready. She had called ahead and the next morning several suitcases would arrive, apparently from the airport, bearing Ms Cloudfield’s name. They were seemingly full of stuff but that was just cheap knock offs. She would replace it all with the real things and then she would leave, bye bye, adios, hasta la vista daaarlings! 

She had flown in from another of the large airports, incognito of course and used a fake name the actress often made use off, the airports knew who it was and with the disguise it had been easy enough to fool them. One swift flight on first class, arriving in the middle of the day when the traffic was at its worst and it was on. She had to congratulate herself, it was sheer luck that she was so similar to the actress and knew how to use both make up and clothes to become even more similar. The eye colour was wrong but she had contacts and a dentist had put some veneers on her front teeth to make them more straight and white. If you didn’t know the actress personally it was not very likely that you would be able to discover that this was an impostor. 

Justine did enjoy a peaceful evening within the suite with Ms Cloudfield’s favourite TV show which fortunately happened to be her favourite too and when she went to bed that evening she knew that this was the smartest move she had ever made. She would increase her wealth tenfold and nobody would be able to figure out what had happened. The hotel would most likely try to hush it all down and the actress would probably be on TV telling how violated she felt but it would only add to her fame. Justine was in fact doing her a favour. She fell asleep in the certainty of her own cleverness and didn’t even for a second doubt herself and her questionable morale.   
\------------------------------------

Bard was groaning, he felt as if his heart was about to pop out of his chest and sweat was pouring down his back, it felt like he had been caught outside in some torrential rain. “Three more Mr Bowman, come on, you can do it!”

Bard felt an intense urge to scream back and ask the personal coach to go fuck himself with a raw iron but didn’t. Thran was just some feet away, lifting weights and Bard didn’t want to lose his temper in front of his husband. “Ghaaa!”

He was shivering, the human body wasn’t made for this sort of punishment and he was dead sure that his kneecaps would pop loose like hubcaps there and then. Why had he agreed upon this torture? Thran did turn his head, he was sweating too but grinning, for some bizarre reason his beloved did actually enjoy pushing himself. “Think about the task ahead, just that, clear your mind” 

Bard growled. In just one week it was time for the physical check up all officers had to go through once a year, it did include both a visit at the doctors and some exercises which had to be done with a minimum of errors. If you failed you risked being sent out on foot patrol, the police corps had decided that it was time to get rid of the age old image of police men as donut chewing fast food loving slackers and thus this, each officer had been assigned a personal trainer who made a training program designed for each person’s level of fitness.   
Apparently Bard was regarded as a couch potato for this was worse than the training you had to go through to become a Navy seal, he was dead sure of it. Thran snickered. “You should have seen yourself, a tomato wouldn’t look that red ever” 

Bard pushed back against the goddamn torture device with all his might, the weights did rise, about half an inch. The coach was jumping up and down. “Come on, use your legs man, tighten you core muscles and push!”

Bard rolled his eyes, he hadn’t heard that many orders for pushing and that many moans and groans since he visited a maternity ward. This was just silly, no amount of training could fix his lack of “explosive strength” and “questionable endurance” in just a week. Besides, Thran never complained about neither of those so why did he really care? The entire training room was filled with sweating men and the smell in there could have made an ox faint. Thran finished his round and sat up, the long blonde hair was braided and tied back and he grinned, eyes shining. “You really feel alive when you have pushed yourself this hard” 

Bard groaned like a cow in labour” Alive?! Damn you, I feel like the mortuary is my next destination” 

Thran laughed and got up, stretched out and Bard forgot how to breathe for a moment, damn, he did it on purpose or else you could call Bard a donkey. The sight was mouth watering and Bard started making plans for the evening. The kids were visiting Jean’s cousin by the coast and they had the house all to themselves. It would be…hot! Bard was sure of that, hot and sticky and….

Thor came inn through the entrance door, waving his hand. “Bowman, Oropherson, my office in five!”

Thran sighed. “That was the end of the fun for this time, let’s hit the showers shall we? I doubt that Thor want’s to wait any longer, it looked as if he meant business” 

Bard closed his eyes in silent thanks to whatever God it was that had looked down upon him in mercy and decided to intervene. The torture was over, yes!  
The shower had to be quick and it was and when the two of them showed up at the office they were at least clean if not dry. Thor did look intense. “Guys, we have a case, and it is….gruesome” 

Thran did tense up. “Gruesome?” 

Thor did nod. “Yes, I have hardly ever seen anything like this” 

Bard felt that the joy did exit him, now he had to think like a cop again, darn it!  
“Murder?” 

Thor nodded “Yes, a celebrity. Ms Cloudfield” 

Thran did gasp. “Are you kidding me?! She has been nominated for the Oscars three times! And is very secretive” 

Thor leaned his chin onto his hands. “She was found murdered this very morning, in a hotel room, her favourite suite at the Danleigh hotel” 

Thran did blink. “A suite? That hotel is expensive as fuck!”

Thor just shrugged. “She is loaded, has more money than the bank, her last movie was a block buster and she earned more money on it than any actress has before for one movie. “ 

Bard tried to think. “So we are going to the Danleigh?” 

Thor nodded. “Yes, you are going, Judith is already there” 

Bard sighed and Thran shrugged. “Come on, we better hurry, we have a corpse waiting for us” 

Bard just couldn’t get over the fact that Thor had called the scene gruesome, it did take quite a lot to get that sort of statement out of him. He did rarely use such strong expressions at all. Thran did drive and the hotel wasn’t that far away from the police station, they were there in just a few minutes and they saw the huge group of police cars and other vehicles which were assembled and Bard made a grimace. If this truly was a dead celebrity he knew that the journalists would descend upon the case like a WW2 bomb raid. 

They entered the foyer and was greeted by a very visibly shaken hotel manager, he was close to tears and his face ashen white. Thran became all professional. Taking the man by the hand, talking in a low and very compassionate tone and the manager did swallow and managed to speak coherently. He did lead them towards the elevators and they did take it up to the suite where a bunch of other police men were hard at work securing the scene. Judith had already arrived as she usually did and she did stand in the door, waiting for the first CSI technicians to declare the room as safe.   
Bard did see that one of the young technicians ran out the door, looking greener than a meadow in summer, he aimed for the hallway bathroom and judging by the sounds he didn’t reach it in time. Bard did brace himself, this could be really bad then. 

They saw that the suite was very exclusive, the furniture very expensive, the view wonderful and the luxuries there top notch, no doubt that Ms Cloudfield had money. The manager was sobbing. “She arrived yesterday, unexpected. She had been heading for a photo shoot in Paris but it got cancelled and she decided to stay here until further notice” 

Bard just nodded, celebrities were infamous for doing things their very own way. Thran did take a deep breath, then they entered the bedroom and Bard let out a yip, he had seen horror before, lots and lots of it, including the case which brought the two of them together but this…Judith let out a squeal behind them and covered her mouth with one hand, eyes huge and filled with shock. “Oh sweet Jesus!”

Bard knew why the CSI technician had bolted, the smell alone… It did smell like a slaughterhouse, raw offal and blood, mixed with perfume and alcohol. The technician who had been first at the scene stood there with his camera, he had already sent photos to Thor and he was making sure to capture the scene from every possible angle. He did tilt his head and there was something about his expression which made Bard turn to him. “Is anything wrong?” 

The technician did shrug, his face contorted. “No, or yes, I am not sure” 

Thran frowned. “Do explain?”

The man lifted his camera, it was an expensive digital one and he pointed at the lights in the ceiling. “I am a photographer, it is what I do for a living. If you are to get good pictures you need to make sure that the light and everything is just perfect right? And this…the light is adjusted so it is absolutely the best possible for a photo shoot” 

Bard had to look at the scene again, he swallowed, hard. Thran was pale and Judith was already putting on gloves and a suit, she was cussing to herself. “Getting it all with us will be hard!”

The corpse of what had been Ms Cloudfield was arranged, no other word could describe it. It was an artistic message there but an grotesque one, one which was completely inhuman. Bard had never seen anything worse than this. The dead body was placed on the bed laying across it. The head was twisted into a sort of very unnatural position and the eyes were open, staring with an expression of utter horror. The torso was arranged with its arms straight out to the sides, the legs were open and spread as far as possible, in fact they were way too far apart and Bard wondered if the pelvis had been fractured for that to happen.   
The dead woman was completely exposed but the real horror was her mid section, her abdomen had been cut open and all her entrails were pulled out and arranged over the head board of the bed and the huge wrought iron decoration hanging above it. Some of the organs were placed neatly beside the body and Judith was staring at the whole mess, her lips were moving all the time as if she was praying. The woman’s breasts had been removed, only bloody wounds did remain and they were apparently missing. 

Thran stared at the horrible sight, he was breathing rather fast. “This one is completely and utterly mad, and he is enjoying it” 

Bard just whispered. “No shit, we are talking Hannibal Lecter grade madness here aren’t we?” 

Thran shook his head. “No, worse, way worse!”

The photographer sort of groaned. “Whoever did this, pictures were taken, many! Perhaps even film. There are some small marks on the carpet which indicates the use of a tripod, could be a camera with both movie and photo recording” 

Thran nodded. “The perpetrator wanted to document what he was doing, it gets him off. He is in control, and he wants to relive the scene again.” 

Bard felt sick to the core and he had to leave the room. The manager was outside and Bard tried to think clearly. “Alright, when was she last seen?” 

The manager lifted a small hand held computer. “At eight last night, she called room service for a cup of warm cocoa with cinnamon and rum. She always does that” 

Bard walked over to the living room, it was undisturbed and he saw that there were several movable clothes racks there. The managed tried to smile. “She had sent her luggage ahead of her, needed some things and she does rent a storage room here at the hotel, in the basement. She was one of our regular customers, and we were all very fond of her”

Bard nodded. “So she wasn’t some diva?” 

The manager did grin again, a real smile this time. “Oh she was a diva but also a lady, to the very core. Always polite and always very nice to everybody, even the servants. Of course she had her odd quirks but we loved her, not only because of her money if that is what you think”

Bard made a note of it. “The suite is the only one on this floor?”

The managed nodded. “Yes, and it is sound proofed too, we do take care of the privacy of our guests!” 

Bard sighed, she could have screamed for help and nobody would have heard her, poor soul!  
Thran did walk around the room and he did stop, stared at a coffee table by the window. “She did order a cup of cocoa? “

The managed nodded. “Yes, it was a habit of hers?!” 

Thran pointed at a cup standing on the table. “It is here still, full. She didn’t drink it!”

The manager frowned. “That is odd, she loved that cocoa so much” 

The elevator doors did open and one of the receptionists did enter the hallway, he did wave his hand at the manager. “Ah Sir, her luggage, it has arrived from the airport, what are we to do with it?” 

The manager stared at Bard with an expression of helplessness on his face, not knowing what to do. Bard smiled, a stiff smile. “If you have some spare room place it there, under lock and key. The technicians will probably like to take a look at it and the contents are the property of whoever is to inherit her stuff” 

The managed let out a thin wail. “Oh gods, this is horrible, if this gets out we are screwed, nobody would want to come here now!” 

Thran did shake his head. “On the contrary Mr, people flock to the places where a celebrity has died, you will be able to double the price of this suite now, or even triple it and still people will come” 

The manager did look aghast! “God! no! This suite….It will be demolished, completely, we will turn it into ordinary regular rooms. I cannot stand the idea of having it cleaned and put back into service” 

Bard realized that the manager in fact was a very decent person, not only interested in making a profit. They stood there when there was a yell heard from the bedroom and Bard and Thran turned and ran back inside of it, Judith was standing there holding a lump of bloody tissue and Bard had problems identifying it until Thran made a sort of groan” It is one of her breasts, where…?” 

Judith was ashen grey and her hands were shivering. “It was…it was placed within her….vagina” 

Bard felt dizzy. “Jeeez, a pervert?” 

Thran nodded. “The very worst kind of pervert. The murdering kind” 

Judith put the tissue into a evidence box and closed the lid, she was dark eyed and shaking all over. “This woman was tortured before she died, probably for hours. The injuries I have found…God, if you don’t catch this bastard I am gonna fry you both, you hear?”

Judith didn’t usually make such statements and Bard nodded. “Duly noted.” 

Judith did walk over to the other side of the bed and her face was stern, cold, expressionless. “She has been raped, several times I bet, both vaginal and anal rape, also with some sort of object. A very large one. She is torn up on the inside, I am almost one hundred percent sure that the cause of death is blood loss and shock.” 

Thran moaned and Bard had to look at the view again, just to clear his mind. This person had suffered for a long time, it was just too awful to think about. “Who does something like this to a living human being?” 

Judith’s voice was hoarse and Thran cleared his voice before he answered. “A monster, someone who isn’t human anymore, not in the sense we normally define humanity. This is a person who is obsessed with something about this scene, and her.” 

He snapped his fingers, turned to one of the police officers. “Do me a favour, check if there are any scenes like this in any of her movies, her on her back across a bed, spread out like a sacrifice?”

The officer nodded and ran off, thankful that was allowed to leave the room. He did almost collide with one of the hotel staff who was exiting the elevator, looking very uncertain. “Ah excuse me? Uh, there is something…” 

Bard nodded. “Yes? Go on?” 

The young man did look down, obviously embarrassed. “We were placing the suitcases in one of our storage rooms in the basement and…well…the luggage handler did slip and one of the suitcases did open up. And it…the contents were just pieces of cloth, no real clothes at all, just cheap cotton” 

Bard frowned and the man was red in the face. “Uh, we did open one of the other suitcases, just to make sure that it wasn’t some mistake and …that too was filled with rags”

Bard was about to answer when Judith let out a sort of squeal yet again and Bard rolled his eyes, hard. What sort of horror had she now uncovered?  
The coroner did enter the hallway, her eyes huge. “Guys, we are in trouble, we are in such deep shit that I cannot even begin to describe it!” 

She turned to the manager. “Please, tell me that the police is the only ones who knows about this yet? If not…” 

The manager did look very scared. “Ah, we haven’t notified anybody except the police no, our employees are very well trained too, nobody will speak to anyone, our discretion is a guarantee, no matter what happens, what is wrong?” 

Judith was breathing hard. “Guys, the woman in there, she isn’t Ms Cloudfield!”

The manager gaped. “WHAT?!”

Bard gaped too. “Are you fucking kidding me?” 

Judith help up a small glass tube, inside of it was two small pieces of plastic, coloured brown. “Ms Cloudfield has brown eyes, this woman was wearing contacts, her eyes are blue! And she is about an inch and a half shorter than Ms Cloudfield too. And about fifteen years younger too I would recon “

The hotel manager was just opening and closing his mouth, he did look like a fish. “That…that is…how is it possible…” 

Judith sighed. “Don’t ask me how, but the real Ms Cloudfield is alive somewhere and must be found asap, and nobody must learn of this, if the murderer find out he murdered the wrong woman he’ll got after the real Ms Cloudfield again, that is a guarantee” 

Thran sprang into action. “Right, I know who her agent is, he has to know where she is at the moment. But Bard, this has to be handled in a different manner than a usual case. The media has to find out” 

Bard frowned. “Uh? Why? That will… “ 

Thran stared at him. “This murderer wants recognition, he wants fame, he wants to bask in his triumph. If we deny him that he will try again, and again…he is insatiable Bard, we must give him what he wants, to keep him at bay until we can identify him” 

Bard nodded. “Alright but how?” 

Thran turned to the hotel manager. “Do you have any employees speaking a foreign language? With a heavy accent?” 

The manager did nod. “Ah yes? We have a lady here who is Polish, her accent is very broad?” 

Thran nodded. “Wait until we have cleared out the suite and removed the body, then get your employee to call the largest news papers, anonymously from one of your phone booths. Tell her to just claim that Ms Cloudfield has been murdered here in your hotel this morning” 

The manager was sweating. “Dear lord, they will gather here like vultures but alright, if it is to protect the real Ms Cloudfield” 

Judith bowed her head. “We would be very grateful yes, this woman was an impostor and if I am not wrong a very good one. She was probably going to replace the rags in her luggage with Ms Cloudfield’s things and then sell them online.” 

The manager did look a bit nauseous. “Gods, that is horrible, and yet, I cannot help but feel sorry for her, poor woman, whoever she was. Nobody deserve to suffer thus” 

Thran grasped his cell phone, his face was stern. “Exactly. Judith, do you think you can identify her?” 

Judith nodded. “Yes, if she is a con artist I bet she has been arrested at some point, her finger prints could be in the data base”

Thran was searching the web. “Call me when you find her true identity? She may have family somewhere who needs to be informed of this. I am gonna call Ms Cloudfield’s agent here and now. Before the shit hits the fan” 

Thran left the hallway to have some peace and quiet and Bard helped the officers remove things which could be crucial to the investigation. Judith and her employees were removing the body and she shrugged and sent Bard a sad grin. “Her left boob is still missing, I bet the perp did take it with him”

Bard nodded. “Yeah, as a sick souvenir I bet”

Judith pulled off her gloves and put on a new pair. “I am glad I am a coroner, working with dead corpses. A celebrity has no real life anymore, these days there are cameras everywhere, and I bet that there are paparazzies stalking the poor woman every day.” 

Bard nodded. “Yeah, not being able to leave the door without looking perfect has to be a burden, I would have gone mad” 

Then a though hit him, hard. “Damn it, the perp, he has to have seen her arrive at the hotel!”

He almost shook the hotel manager like a ragdoll. “Fast, how often does Ms Cloudfield stay here?” 

The manager blinked, a bit shocked by the passionate outburst. “Ah at least twice each month? Sometimes even more” 

Bard tried to control himself. “Who else uses the suite?” 

The manager tried to smile. “Few, very few. It is expensive and we try to keep it just for her. We have had two or three other guests this year. A Saudi Arabian princess and then a CEO from a Chinese Oil company” 

Bard was thinking fast. “You said that you do prioritize the privacy of your guests, does the suite come with anti-spying equipment?” 

The manager nodded. “Of course? That is something everybody does expect these days. We have a closed Wi fi system which has to be logged into and it is safer than fort Knox. There are scrambling devises placed within the suite, nobody can leave things like microphones or hidden cameras without us finding them right away”

Bard smiled. “Good, the perp was outside then, and he saw that she was inside of the suite and then he decided to strike”

Judith stared out of the window. “Ah, how could he see that…” 

Bard pointed. “See that building? He was on the roof, you can call me a piece of butter if I am wrong. He has kept the hotel under watch for weeks I bet, waiting for the right moment to strike” 

The manager blinked again. “That is also a hotel, a nice one but not as nice as ours of course, and it is also a casino” 

Judith nodded. “And it houses conferences too, Bard, you are onto something” 

The manager did look uncomfortable. “But…how did the…perp…get up here unseen? We have surveillance camera’s everywhere outside of the suites and we haven’t seen anything at all.” 

Judith made a grimace. “Yeah, he has brought some equipment too, I bet that he had at least one camera and maybe even some movable lights. And rope, perhaps handcuffs, she has some abrasions which indicate that she was forced to wear some sort of garment, a very tight one, probably rubber. “ 

Bard closed his eyes. “He really made every sick fantasy come to life now didn’t he?” 

Judith nodded. “Yes, and he did use a condom so there is no DNA unless she managed to scratch him. He must have taken the used rubber with him”

Bard sighed. “He had it all planned, to the smallest detail. He must feel like the master of the world now. “ 

Judith looked down. “And if the truth gets out? Oh he will explode” 

Thran did return to the room, holding his phone. “Guys, I have talked to her agent. Ms Cloudfield is on Hawaii, with her new boyfriend. She will stay there until further notice and keep her head low so to speak. But the agent did tell me something very interesting” 

Bard cocked his head. “Oh? What?” 

Thran sat down. “She had her fair share of stalkers, stars usually does, but lately she has gotten some letters which were very disturbing” 

He did open the phone and showed them a pile of papers, all written with the same bold letters and the same message. “It should have been mine. Bitch!”

Under the written words was an image, from a movie and Bard recognized it. It was from the most popular of Ms Cloudfield’s movies, about a rich heiress who against the advice of her posh family marries a man from a lesser family only to discover that he is doing it only for her money. She almost nailed an Oscar with that one. The image showed Ms Cloudfield laying across a bed with her body stretched out and she held a razor in one hand and appeared to have slit her own throat. 

The police officer they had asked to check the movies did return and held an image in his hand. “It is this scene, from the movie “The final kiss” It is five years old” 

Bard saw that the police man had found that same image as they had. “We already know, thanks for the effort. “

The police man did look a bit disappointed but nodded and left and Bard grasped Thran by the shoulder. “The perp has been watching this suite, from afar. Probably the hotel to the west of here”

Thran did turn around. “It is more than two miles from here?” 

Bard nodded. “Yes, but I bet he had a telescope.” 

Thran turned to Judith. “Alright, find out who Ms Doe here was and we go to check that other hotel. Maybe somebody there has seen anything” 

Judith just nodded and the two did enter the elevator and pushed the button for the foyer. Thran was thinking very hard. “He has entered this room sometime last night, before midnight I bet”

Bard frowned. “Why do you think so?” 

Thran made a grimace. “This perp is a perfectionist, I bet he sees himself as someone who is above the rest of humanity, and he has made good preparations, he would hate to be disturbed by anything.”

Bard still didn’t understand. “And?”

Thran made a gesture out towards the open space in front of the hotel. “He wanted to take photos right? The windows were not covered and at midnight the hotel does have a fireworks show each night. It is quite spectacular and noisy too, a perfect cover really.”

Bard bit his lower lip. “He entered before the show started and attacked as it began?”

Thran nodded. “Yes, to be absolutely sure that she didn’t detect him until it was too late. The light from the show must have been almost blinding at that floor, and the windows are huge and turned in the direction of the plaza”

Bard sighed. “There was nothing on the surveillance videos?” 

Thran nodded. “Yes, so he must have entered some other way, but how? And from where?” 

Bard tried to think. “Ah, could there be secret entrances to the suite?”

Thran raised an eyebrow. “And the manager doesn’t know of them? I doubt it” 

Bard just shrugged. “It was just an idea”

They entered the foyer and left the hotel, Thran was driving and he was quiet. Bard knew him well now, he was thinking, and he was scared and fascinated. It was very rare to encounter a truly monstrous human being and this could easily be one of those. The other hotel wasn’t that luxurious but it was nice still and the clerk at the desk did smile at them as they entered. She was a small and rather trim woman with a name sign telling everybody that her name was Sindy and Thran did put on his most charming smile. She saw their police badges and raised an eyebrow but she didn’t look alarmed at all. Thran did introduce himself and Bard and the woman gave them her full attention. “We have a question for the staff here, have anybody seen a person carrying something which can be a telescope?” 

Sindy frowned. “A telescope? Oh sweet lord, we have had a conference here for the last two weeks, amateur astronomers! It would be more odd to see someone without a telescope than one with one”

Bard groaned. “Alright, how about your roof? Does anybody have access to it?” 

The clerk shrugged. “Everybody? We have a nice little garden up there, it is open at all hours?”

Thran turned to Bard. “He isn’t using the roof Bard, he would be discovered. But he is most likely renting a room here, on one of the top floors”

He turned back to Sindy. “Listen, we are looking for a man who may have murdered somebody, and he must have been staying here rather often, and he has probably been spying on the surrounding buildings” 

Sindy made a sort of pout. “I am not really allowed to give this sort of information to anybody but since you are the police, I can check it out?” 

Bard nodded. “You would be an angel if you do, we are very grateful” 

She went over to her computer and started typing. They had to wait for a while but she did seem like a person who likes to be thorough. “Well, nobody has stayed in the same room over time but there is a few guests here who has returned quite often over the last months and they have stayed in different rooms each time?”

Thran smiled. “That is great, any on the upper floors?”

She was typing again. “Three people, you are sure that this information won’t be shared? It is my job on the line here”

Bard did look sincere. “I give you my word!” 

She pressed a button and a printer started to whine and shriek. A piece of paper left it and was handed over and Thran did take it and stared at the three names on it. He did frown. “Two men and a woman, I think we can ignore the woman for now. Women doesn’t do such things, and besides, the victim was raped”

Sindy frowned. “It was a rapist? Oh Gods, is the person dangerous?” 

Thran sent her a calming smile. “Yes, but not for the common person, this is a person with a very unhealthy obsession with a certain somebody” 

Sindy let out a small sigh of relief. “Good, I don’t wanna have the night watch if there are crazy bastards running around here”

Thran was about to say good bye when one of the elevators opened and a man wearing overalls and a sort of harness did enter the foyer. He smiled at Sindy and ignored the two men and Thran stared at him with huge eyes. “Oh God”

Bard frowned. “What is it?” 

Thran did grasp his phone. “I know how the bastard entered the suite!”

He called a number and when it answered at the other end he did speak very fast. “Fred? It is Thran, do me a favour, if you still are at the suite check the bathroom window, is it possible to open it, from the outside? Is it loose somehow?” 

There was silence and Bard heard the sound of feet and a door was being opened. Then they heard a man grunt and moan and a creaking sound, it was rather loud. “Yes, there are a set of extra attachments on the window, these bathroom windows aren’t really made to be opened? And there is a sort of handle here too” 

They heard the sound of wind passing by and Thran sighed. “Thank you Fred, dust the handle but I bet the perp used gloves. We know how he entered now”

Thran turned to Bard. “He used the windowcleaner’s elevator. It is noisy but has room for much equipment and the fireworks would camouflage the sound of it moving, and also the window being opened.”

Bard closed his eyes. “And the shape of the façade makes it impossible to see it from the livingroom. Clever bastard” 

Thran made a new call. “It is Thran, check the roof, somebody has been up there and tinkered with the window cleaner’s elevator. Yes, it was the perp. Check it thoroughly, each bolt and nut!”

Bard swallowed hard. “So, who are the suspects?” 

Thran held out the list and Bard did read it, very fast. “Mr Jaamal Hasreet? Of Cairo Egypt. He is a businessman dealing with Egyptian cotton sheets. I doubt this is the one” 

Thran nodded. “So do I, I cannot imagine that a person from a foreign country has the opportunity to stalk a celebrity thus” 

Bard did read the next name. “Mr Bartholomew Downs, retired school teacher, in town to help the local museum with an exhibition about the natives?”

Thran did type very fast on his smart phone. “Yes, I found the museums home page, Mr Downs have helped them before and it says here that he is eighty four and almost deaf.” 

Bard sighed. “Hardly our guy then, could it be an employee?” 

Thran shrugged. “Not very likely! Who has time to spy while on the job? Somebody would notice for sure. No, this is odd. “

Bard did read the last name. “Ms Beatrix Lindenwald, occupation dancer?” 

Thran nodded. “Women doesn’t kill like that, she is in the clear.” 

Bard sighed, he felt a bit down, how were they to catch this one? “So what now?” 

Thran opened the car door and entered. “I haven’t got a clue, let us return to the station, I bet Thor want’s an update”

They drove back in silence and Bard wished that he still was sweating it out under the not so tender care of that goddamn trainer. It would have been easier to deal with. Thor listened to everything they had to say and the officers left at the scene did call inn too, no fingerprints and the elevator was in pristine shape. Not even a single fiber left. The person had to have entered the rooftop during the day when the doors had been opened so the window cleaners could do their job and probably hid somewhere, presumably behind on of the AC units. The only thing they did find was some gravel which had been disturbed, but there were no footprints at all. The perp had probably taken one of the elevators down and replaced the original window with a new one when the suite was empty, there was always some sort of maintaining work being done so nobody would react to a person in an overall carrying equipment. 

Bard and Thran did go to eat and then they wrote a quick report of what they had seen. Some officers would check the alibi of both the men on Sindy’s list but it was very obvious that neither of them could be regarded as a suspect. Thran just sat there thinking when Judith did call them and they went down to the morgue right away. She was done with the initial examination of the remains and she was cleaning the bench as they entered. She made a grimace. “I have seen a lot, but this…I cannot even begin to comprehend such sadism. It is completely inhuman!”

Thran took a deep breath. “Talk us through it” 

Judith seemed to brace herself. “Right, where do I start? Ah, let us start at the top shall we?”

She grabbed a piece of paper. “She wore a wig, a very good one for it didn’t come off even if it must have been pulled at, hard. Her scalp had some bruises, she was a natural blonde by the way. She had veneers and contacts as you already know.” 

She did look uncomfortable. “Ah, the boobs were cut off her, and here the perp has made a mistake” 

Thran suddenly looked like a hunting dog on a fresh scent track. “Oh?!”

She nodded. “Ms Cloudfield has implants. It isn’t widely known though, I called her plastic surgeon to get the information. So the perp doesn’t know absolutely everything about Ms Cloudfield” 

Thran did almost sneer. “He is thorough, that is odd, he should have known if he is a real stalker. When did Ms Cloudfield have the implants done?” 

 

Judith shrugged. “Ten years ago, before the career really took off” 

Thran snapped his finger. “The perp haven’t bothered with Ms Cloudfield’s past then. He has become obsessed rather recently, perhaps when her movies became popular”

Judith nodded. “Yes, Ms Cloudfield was a nobody for many years, not very famous at all. It was the movie Hidden dancer which made her a star, over night”

Bard frowned. “I don’t think I have heard of it?” 

Thran smiled. “Really? It was a very good movie, a tear jerker I have heard” 

Judith tilted her head. “I can vouch for that yes, I saw it and cried for hours afterwards”

She lifted the sheet again. “The rape damage you already know off, she had broken ribs, torn muscles and tendons, bruises and cuts and then the disembowelment of course. Her toe nails were torn out, one by one, so was her finger nails and I do also believe that the perp used a sort of small metal object to make burn marks on her. It was very round and only about five mm in diameter.” 

Thran closed his eyes. “Show me” 

Judith did pull the sheet aside, and let Thran see a hand, it was grotesque but there was a row of marks around the wrist, like a beaded bracelet only that the beads were burn marks. Thran stared at them. “This is rage, this is punishment, deliberately done. Not only to torment but to settle a score of some sorts. It does speak of an intense hatred, on a personal level. I think I know what the perp used!” 

Judith stared at him, with an open mouth. “You do?”

Thran did reach into his pocket and pulled out a very expensive pen he always carried with him. “The hotel has some very nice pens in the suites, made from steel. The perp heated a pen with a lighter and used it, I think I sense some sort of symbolism here.”

Judith was pale. “A screenplay?”

Thran nodded. “Or a role which got snatched from somebody? Or simply an obsession with a role character. I have seen that before”

Bard swallowed. “Really?” 

Thran sighed. “Yes, a case some years ago, a man who was stalking a local actress, he couldn’t separate between her and the character she played in a TV show, he wanted to punish her for her infidelity. It took months before we were able to make him realize that it was just a TV show, make believe, the result of somebody writing a very popular novel the company wanted to turn into a series!” 

Judith shook her head. “Humans, sometimes their stupidity is unbelievable.” 

Thran snickered. “Yes, Einstein said that there only are two things which are infinite, space and human stupidity and he wasn’t so sure about the first. “ 

Suddenly a computer beeped and Judith did run over, hope written all over her face. She stared at the screen and let out a sigh of relief. “Guys, she is identified. Meet Justine Combs, she is a professional scam artist, damnation and thunder, this woman has done it all!” 

Thran did cock his head, his eyes very keen. “She has been arrested?”

Judith nodded. “Oh-yes!! Several times, once for trying to presume the identity of a police officer and another time for insurance fraud. She tried to sue a restaurant for having sold her a meal which did contain nuts but the restaurant didn’t use nuts at all so it was exposed as a fraud rather easily” 

Bard stared at the sheet which covered the earthly remains of this Ms Combs. “Still, she was a human being and deserves justice. What was done to her…” 

Judith sighed. “Yes, she was only thirty one, believe that? So young!” 

The intercom did beep and Judith answered it, they heard Thor’s voice. “The hotel manager called me, they are gonna make the anonymous call now, get ready for a storm” 

Bard and Thran stared at each other, now anything could happen.   
\-----  
It took exactly three hours, then the media was buzzing like a bee swarm, nobody did really believe that the dead person was Ms Cloudfield, even if the hotel did confirm the identity of the deceased person. The real Ms Cloudfield was safe in Hawaii and the hotel she lived on had closed down in order to prevent anybody from seeing that she was there and alive. Now it was a good thing that she was such a private and secretive person, very few knew she was there and the other guests had barely seen her at all. The staff did keep their mouths shut and Ms Cloudfield had been ordered to lay low by her agent, until the perp was apprehended.

The TV reporters did gather around the hotel where the murder had happened and the internet was alight with all sorts of theories. Some were absolutely outrageous like the ones which claimed that the actress had been murdered by the Illuminati for having portrayed Mary Magdalene in a movie. Others said that aliens had killed her since she was to play in a sci fi movie come the spring. It was a chaos and the movies she had played in become even more popular within a few hours. Some streaming sites did crash and the movie companies must have thought that people were insane for suddenly they made money on movies which had been almost forgotten for almost a decade.

Bard was at the phone arguing with some nosey reporter when Thor waved his hand at him, he did look pale and Bard hung up and ran over to the office. Thor was staring at the screen of his computer and Bard felt dizzy, almost to the point of dropping to the floor. It was a video, and it was horrible. Thor was staring at the wall, his expression one of barely controlled horror. “It is several videos and a heck of a lot of photos, it is…”

Bard made a croak, his voice didn’t work at all now. “Ah, Gods, it is just gruesome”

Thor did push a button. “Look at this” 

A piece of text appeared, white on black. “It ought to be mine!” 

Bard saw that Thran did enter too and he stared at the text, eyes narrow and there was a quivering in his jaw muscles, as if he was grinding his teeth. “God! I recon the videos are graphic?” 

Thor nodded. “Even if they had been CGI this would have been deemed as too graphic for viewing, I just pray that the perp only sent it to me, not to the media” 

Thran shook his head. “Sorry Thor, he has sent it everywhere, he wants to be famous, he wants to be remembered, to be looked up to, feared and admired. This is a person who is so twisted I can barely begin to describe it.” 

Thor swallowed. “Psychopath?” 

Thran shook his head. “That is just the first letter” 

Thran turned to the screen. “I need to watch those videos, and the photos. The perp must have done something which can reveal something about him. At least I can try to get inside of his mind” 

Bard cringed. “Are you sure you want to…” 

Thran sighed, his shoulders did sag. “No, I don’t really want to do this but I have to, I am the only profiler available. Don’t worry, I can handle it” 

Bard grasped his arm. “I will watch it with you, you shouldn’t have to carry this burden alone” 

Thran just smiled and squeezed Bard’s hand back in thanks. Thor did close the door to the office and pulled down the shades. “Alright guys, go ahead but if it gets too much don’t hesitate to leave, I want you up and ready to work, not curled up in a corner with severe PTSD” 

Thran gave Thor a thumbs up and hit the start button on the keyboard. Bard swallowed hard and it took about twenty seconds before he did regret his decision, a lot! 

Thran was staring at the screen, his jaw set and his gaze like steel, cold and intense. He did make notes, hastily scribbled letters upon a piece of paper and Bard wished that he had owned Thran’s ability to distance himself from what he did see. The video was horrible, Bard felt sick to his gut and he couldn’t believe the horrors he did watch. Torture didn’t even start to describe it and all the time they saw the face of the woman, staring at the camera, eyes wide open with terror and pain.  
She was forced to wear a sort of rubber cat suit and the perp was standing there with a gun, aiming for her head, making her crawl on the floor like an animal. Bard tried to concentrate upon the perp. It was a tall person, perhaps six foot four and very slender, dressed in a black army suit and a ski mask. The skin around the eyes was painted black and Bard could see that the eyes were dark blue. Thran made a grimace. “He is wearing contacts, the colour is too intense.” 

Bard nodded and tried to see something else which told him anything about the person but it was hard. The thick black cloth did cover the body and the movements were powerful and yet elegant. Every move seemed to be almost rehearsed and Thran was grunting. “He is very careful, and yet there is such a display of anger here, wild untamed wrath. Just watch him whip her? He isn’t holding back, he is giving it all that he has got and yet he isn’t stepping out of line even once, he wants this to last, to keep her alive for as long as possible while making her suffer. And he is set upon humiliating her, dehumanizing her, making her into an object, he is trying to ruin her reputation I think, and also feeding his own wrath.”

Bard nodded, he was staring at the wall, the perp was raping the victim now, with just his fly open. Thran was frowning. “What the fuck? Did he arrive there already wearing a condom?” 

The profiler did pause the video and then he did zoom inn, the image became rather grainy fast but he did squint at the screen. “Bard, do you see what I see?” 

Bard tried to smile. “Uhm…an erection with a condom on it?” 

Thran shook his head. “No, look! Where the shaft meet the body? It is visible for just a few seconds” 

He did wind back a few seconds and started the video again, Bard had to get really close to see what Thran was referring to. “Is he wearing a cock ring?!”

Thran nodded “Yes, he was hard already when he did get it out of his pants, I am starting to think that he was more prepared than we think” 

Bard frowned. “Uh, what do you mean?”

Thran turned off the screen. “Listen, what makes a man wear such a devise?”

Bard shrugged, his face turning slightly red. “Well, to avoid losing an erection? To last longer?”

Thran nodded. “Yes, and also, to get an erection and keeping it, in cases of impotence”

Bard gaped. “Are you serious?! Could the perp be impotent?”

Thran nodded. “Wouldn’t surprise me at all, that sort of problems can cause some men to become very frustrated and even violent, they feel as if they have lost their masculinity and power and seek to regain it, to whatever cost. They have to prove to themselves that they are still men, still in control.”

Bard closed his eyes for a second. “I have heard about that yes, so you think he has problems with keeping an erection?” 

Thran smiled, his eyes were shining. “Oh yes, and to do this to the actress he had to be able to get it up, he couldn’t risk it being unwilling to function so he made sure that it stays up” 

Bard nodded. “And?” 

Thran did look frantic. “He is desperate Bard, willing to risk serious injury to get his vengeance or whatever it is he is after. What man is willing to risk losing his ability to fuck just for the sake of getting even or fulfilling some sick fantasy?” 

Bard stared at his partner, it was dawning upon him. “Uhm, someone who has nothing to lose?” 

Thran nodded and did look like a school teacher with a very good student. “Exactly! He is either completely impotent already or he is going to be unable to get an erection soon. I am starting to feel that this perp was in a hurry to get it done” 

Bard frowned. “Ms Comb was in the wrong place at the wrong time?”

Thran sent him a sad grin. “Yes, if she hadn’t chosen to visit that hotel posing as Ms Cloudfield he would have had to wait for the real actress to arrive.” 

Bard sighed. “Poor woman, that is bad luck at its most extreme.” 

Thran was obviously thinking hard. “I just cannot get it all to add up. The text he sent to the actress, and showed in the video. What was he talking about? I cannot wrap my head around it?” 

Bard made a grimace. “Well, it cannot have been a role? Ms Cloudfield was a woman after all and if the perp is male…” 

Thran suddenly looked as if he had seen a ghost, his eyes were huge and he did grasp Bard’s hand, so hard it actually hurt. “Oh shit, we have been idiots, no, we have been blind!”

He did start the video again and zoomed inn again, in one shot you could see the perp in profile and Thran froze the picture. “Bard, what do you see?”

Bard didn’t understand. “Uh, the perp?” 

Thran was grinding his teeth. “NO! goddamn it, his profile!”

Bard tried to think like a cop again, and then he frowned. “Uh, he is a bit chesty for a slender guy?” 

Thran nodded. “Yes, exactly ,there it is! The whole truth!” 

Bard was blinking. “Excuse me? I don’t understand anything, nada!”

Thran closed the screen again, he was almost panting. “The movie, about the dancer. Ms Cloudfield does portray a trans woman, trying to become a ballerina. She almost got an Oscar for that job.” 

Bard just stared at Thran who stared back, eyes wide as saucers. It would have looked absolutely ridiculous if the situation had been different. “The list of names, it is the woman!”

Bard couldn’t believe his own ears. “Are you serious?!”

Thran nodded. “Yes! Bellatrix is a trans woman, probably an actress and not just a dancer.”

Bard swallowed. “And still technically a male?” 

Thran nodded. “Yes, probably impotent due to female hormones but with a ring and a pump the old willy is still capable of working, if only once”

Bard felt a bit faint. “I can hardly believe it” 

Thran sent him a faint grin. “I understand but I am sure of this. The rage and the violence is all male, a real woman would act differently, with much more subtle methods. She is taking away the things which made Ms Cloudfield so beloved by everybody, her lady like behaviour and decency.” 

Bard could only whisper. “Bitch!”

Thran nodded. “Yes, hell hath no wrath like that of a woman scorn and if she used to be a man expect something spectacular”

He did grasp his phone and called Elisa. “It is Thran, do me a favour. See if you can find the address of Ms Bellatrix Lindenwald?” 

Elisa was on it and Thran turned to Bard. “This is rather special, I have never heard of a similar case ever! People who are trans are usually not this mad, but there is a rotten apple in every barrel or so they say. The rage and the violence is typical for a male who feels that he has been betrayed somehow.” 

Elisa came back on. “Thran? She has a registered address in the next county, a small farm. She is working for a company within this city, Ithildin dancing company. Right now they are staging “The nutcracker”. “ 

Bard and Thran took a collective breath. “Then she is most likely there, we have to work fast, before she realize that she killed the wrong person.”

Bard did wet his lips. “What do you think will happen if she does find out?” 

Thran made a grimace. “A complete meltdown, possibly a violent one too.” 

He ran out the door and called out to Thor who did look a bit like a deer caught in the headlights for a few seconds. Thran could be terrifying at times and now he was ablaze with zeal and also a sort of anger. “We need all the available men, sent to the old Theatre downtown. The killer is there Thor, and it is a trans woman named Bellatrix Lindenwald” 

Thor gaped. “Are you nuts?” 

Thran shook his head. “Not more than usual no, I think she must have applied for the role in a movie which became very popular and Ms Cloudfield got the role instead of her. To some that sort of thing can grow into a obsession.”

Thor did nod. “Alright, I will send all units to the place but God help you if you are wrong on this one” 

Thran grinned. “Trust me, I am not!” 

He did wave a finger. “And no sirens or lights, just very quiet approach. The perp cannot know that she is about to get caught before it is too late” 

Thor ran off to give the orders and Thran did turn to Bard and gave him a swift kiss, his eyes were aglow with eager energy. “I just pray that we are able to catch this person without any bloodshed. “ 

Bard ran to get his gun and Thran did find a couple of flak wests and then they did find the fastest police cruiser within the garage. Thran did drive as usual and now he did really reveal that he could drive like a race car driver. He did use the road like nobody else Bard had ever encountered and while they were driving Bard did google the name. After just a little searching he did confirm that Bellatrix had tried to get the role in the famous movie but the company had decided that Bellatrix was too masculine for the job, in spite of having gone through hormonal treatment for many years and being a very good dancer. They wanted someone pretty and Bellatrix hadn’t been in any movies after that. She had just danced for several companies but never got further than that.   
Thran was quiet and his eyes were distant. “There is yet something here which doesn’t add up, I just cannot understand it” 

Bard frowned. “What?” 

Thran didn’t turn his head. “A real trans woman is in fact a female at heart, a real woman when it comes to psyche. This person doesn’t act very feminine at all, it is very weird” 

Bard just shrugged, he wasn’t some shrink and had no idea of what Thran truly meant. 

The old theatre was downtown, next to the town hall and it was a grand building which once upon a time had been regarded as one of the finest in the whole country. It was impressive and very important historically. Now huge posters did cover the façade telling of the grand ballet which was being performed there each night and Bard and Thran did pull into a parking lot and waited until at least four other units joined them. Two of the officers did go with Bard and Thran and the others did cover all entrances and did prepare themselves rather well. Thran whispered to them over the com units. “The suspect can be very dangerous, don’t let the fact that she is a female fool you. This is one sick individual and she is not going to go down peacefully if triggered” 

 

Thran and Bard did hear music and they did walk slowly towards it, the officers at their backs and Thran did look very tense. They entered a great hall with a stage and there were rehearsals being held at the moment. There were dancers scurrying around and Thran and Bard did hide their guns and so did the officers. They walked down to the stage casually and relaxed and the dancers didn’t really notice them at first. A woman who did look as if she never had enjoyed a decent meal in her life did approach them, her eyes were narrow and she didn’t appreciate any sort of disturbance, that was very clear. 

Bard did put on his best smile. “Ma’am, sorry to disturb but we do need to find Ms Bellatrix Lindenwald, it is very important” 

The woman did frown. “She is in the wardrobe, I do not like it when my dancers are being distracted so it better be very important indeed” 

Thran did show the woman his police badge and she did frown even deeper. “Has she parked in the wrong place again? We have told you before, the parking lots are marked in the wrong manner.” 

Bard shook his head. “I am sorry to say that it is more serious than that” 

The woman did look as if she was trying to suck the last drops of juice out of a very sour lemon, she made a sort of grimace. “Alright, but be quick at it. The performance starts in just an hour” 

Thran did smile and Bard felt like rolling his eyes, they could only hope that the woman didn’t have an important role for if that was the case this show would have to be cancelled. The hallway leading towards the stairs was filled with dancers and helpers and Bard and Thran did move through the crowd as gently as possible. The wardrobes were placed within a very narrow corridor and there were at least twenty doors. And the corridor was packed, if something went wrong here people could get hurt, seriously. 

The officers were nervous and Thran did bite his lower lip, the room with Bellatrix name was at the end of the corridor and rather elegant with nice painting and Thran did whisper. “It is a fitting room, rather large I bet.”

Bard knew that this was where the workers got their costumes fitted and made and he did make a grimace. He would have preferred a small room. Thran nodded at the officers and opened the door, there was a row of low tables with mirrors on them placed along one wall and then the room opened up into several rows of clothes racks and Bard saw hundreds of places to hide right away. Three women sat by the tables in their costumes, putting on make up and Thran stared at them. Neither of them were very tall, just small willowy ballerinas and he did smile, his most relaxing smile, the three did smile back. “Excuse me my ladies, Ms Bellatrix? Is she somewhere to be found?” 

One of them pointed at the back of the room. “She is working on a costume back there, she is to play the nut cracker you know” 

Bard had to cringe. Ouch, the show would be without its main attraction for sure. Thran did saunter off as if nothing was amiss and Bard was straight behind him and saw a very tall figure standing by a clothing mannequin, obviously trying to attach some pieces of cloth to the uniform. Bard did almost gape, the person was very feminine in spite of the height, in fact she was gorgeous. She turned her head and saw them, first she frowned and then she obviously realized that something was off for she did bolt. 

She was heading for a door in the corner but Thran got in the way and she let out a hiss and grasped for something from a box on a table. It was a sword and she did stab after Thran but he did evade the attack easily and grasped a sword too. He did parry like a master and the woman did reveal that she was no fencer at all. Before long she got forced into a corner and Thran did hit her sword and got it out of her hands. She screamed and tried to reach Thran but the officers did storm forth and grasped her and managed to get the cuffs onto her. She was screaming like a banshee and the voice was surprisingly light. Bard had to look at the face again, tried to see it as a man’s face and it wasn’t impossible but this person had to have looked very androgynous to start with. 

Thran sent her a cold grin. “You are hereby arrested for murder, I bet you already know that don’t you??”

She screeched. “You goddam fucking idiots, she deserved it, she snatched the role right before me, I should have had it, it should have been mine. I took it back, all the fame, all the praise!”

Bard stared at the tall woman who was struggling against the cuffs as the officers did haul her off. “That doesn’t justify murdering somebody in such a horrible manner”

The woman did sneer at him. “What do you know about that ha? I did it all to be like her, to get it all. The fame and the wealth and the respect! It was for nothing!”

Thran was staring at her, his face like stone. “You aren’t really a trans sexual now are you? You just wanted to be a woman to get the good roles” 

She laughed, a shrill laughter. “Of course! Goddamn bitches, they get it all don’t they! They ought to be raped the whole bunch of them, they get the jobs, they get the fame and they don’t have to pay for a single fucking thing!” 

Thran was silent and Bard just shook his head. He had heard of so called “ incels” before but never anybody so crazy he had tried to become a woman to reap the benefits of being female. She swore again. “Goddamn cunt, but I showed her, she was a whore, they all are. Spreading their legs for anyone with power and being goddamn nuns when an ordinary guy tries to get some. Fucking sluts” 

Thran did smile, a very sinister smile. “Know what, for anybody trying to live as a woman you have a very un-ladylike language, and perhaps your choice was a bit hastily made for trying to pose as a female while hating women…well, that is a bit…self-contradictory.” 

The officers were struggling to hold her as they hauled her into the squad car and Thran did take a deep sigh of relief. Bard did pat him on his back. “I didn’t know that you knew how to fence?” 

Thran just shrugged. “I had to learn it as a kid, and I was good. It was actually fun” 

Bard smiled. “I could see that yes, it was impressive” 

Thran sighed and sat down, closed the car door behind him. “I was thinking that the perp was a crazy and sick person, a psychopath of extreme volatility and I was right. This is one who lack any form of empathy and hates women with such a ferocity that he chose to become one thinking that women automatically gets all the good jobs.”

Bard shook his head. “And got very disappointed indeed, when Ms Cloudfield got that role he must have lost it completely” 

Thran almost giggled. “Yeah, talk about disappointment, seems as if it isn’t enough to have boobs to get a job, you have to have talent too” 

Bard nodded. “So what now?” 

Thran drove onto the street. “She will be interrogated, I will be there of course and then there will be a trial and so on. I bet that they will place her in a top security prison.” 

Bard did frown. “A women’s prison?” 

Thran had a devilish grin on his face. “No, for she isn’t really a woman, just a man pretending to be trans, because he believes that being a woman automatically gives you great benefits. Guess if he is gonna be popular in jail” 

Bard had to cringe and then he had to laugh, it was mean but for somebody who had done something that horrible the fate would be well deserved.   
\---------------------------------

Thran was caught up in the interrogations for a few days and the news spread that the dead body had been an impostor and Ms Cloudfield did return from Hawaii and when Bellatrix did hear about this she refused to believe it until Ms Cloudfield did call Thran on skype so the woman could see that it was in fact her and that she was very much alive. 

The reaction was worthy of a price, if not an Oscar then at least the price for loudest roar of the century. All femininity was thrown out the window as Bellatrix did scream the worst insults anybody had ever heard and Ms Cloudfield did end the conversation by in a sweet voice saying “Ditto my dear” 

That made the officers and Thran burst into a fit of laughter for Ms Cloudfield did once again prove that she was a lady to her very fingertips and in every way a person of impeccable manners. Thran did stare at Bellatrix who was red eyed and almost boiling. Since she hadn’t been given any hormonal injections since the apprehension she was starting to grow two day shade and there wasn’t much about her which reminded them of a ballerina now. “Now there you had a real lady, a woman with a capital w. You see, trying to be the great pretender isn’t very wise, your victim did pay with her life and I am sorry to say it but you will pay with your virtue. That pretty face of yours and those fake boobs will make you everybody’s darling once you are behind bars. But maybe it will teach you a lesson or two, about the everyday life of way too many women all over the world. Think about that when they rape you in the showers” 

Bellatrix did just stare, if a gaze could kill they would all have been dead but Thran did just wave his hand at her. “I will give the judge a full report on your mental state, don’t doubt even for a second that you are heading for jail. You are a depraved and sick and evil person but not mentally deranged and I wish that you will stay there and rot for the rest of your miserable life. But I am not a bad person so I will give you a piece of advice, just to be nice. Make sure to make the biggest and meanest guy your boyfriend, then you may be safe from gang bangs. Or else your ass will be the place everybody in the prison do visit on a regular basis” 

He did turn and smiled at the fuming person, blowing her a kiss and closed the door looking very pleased, listening to the impressive tirade of cuss words. He had been unprofessional but it had been worth it. 

Elisa had managed to get a hold of Justine’s family and they were flying in to claim the body, they had always known that Justine would end up dead sooner or later, in their eyes she had been a sinner and a depraved person but they had to agree that not even her wrong doings did justify her terrible end. Judith didn’t share the most graphic details of Justine’s demise and the funeral workers had managed to hide the worst damage so she did look relatively normal when her parents came to see her for the last time. Judith was very grateful for their assistance for she knew how to cut open a body, not to fix it to make it look alive again. The missing breast had been found in Ms Bellatrix freezer so it too would be buried with its owner, Bellatrix had sent the files to Thor just to mock the police and she had also sent her videos to several sites for people like herself, men who hate women because they are unable to see their own short comings and blames the world for their problems instead of taking a look in the mirror and trying to change. 

The trial against Bellatrix was held just two weeks after her apprehension, she had already confessed to the crime and when they did interview the workers on the hotel she had stayed at they did confess to having seen a telescope within the room, and she had often acted very strangely whenever Ms Cloudfield happened to be at her favourite hotel. That Ms Combs did show up when she did was the chance Bellatrix did wait for, the actress being alone without her entourage had been perfect and Bard had to wonder about the odd dance fate sometimes tread. Two impostors, being caught by obsession. One by greed, the other by hatred and it had ended terribly for them both. 

Thran and Bard did get some days alone and enjoyed them to the fullest and a few months later Bard did speak to a police officer who had visited the prison where Bellatrix did serve her time, which was ten lifetimes and then some. They had kept her in isolation for a while but then they had to release her out among the other prisoners and it had taken about three hours before the other inmates did gang up on the former woman and had their way with her as the police officer politely put it. Now she was the bitch of one of the gang leaders there and he would often allow his followers to make use of her to keep their loyalty. Thran giggled when Bard told him. Sometimes Karma does come back to bite you and she can indeed be quite a bitch.


End file.
